Yami no Kenzoku
by Kirachu
Summary: An aftermath of Yami no Matsuei story (TV series). [Complete]
1. Chapter One

Yami no Kenzoku 

**by Kira (kira@shikigami.net)**

**Title: **Yami no Kenzoku, meaning 'Family of Darkness'.  From Yami no Matsuei OST 1, track 09.

**Rating: **PG-13

**Spoilers: **Entire TV series; takes place following.

**Pairings: **TsuzukixHisoka, TatsumixTsuzuki, MurakixTsuzuki

**Genre:** Multi-parter angst, fluff, romance, violence, action, horror, twists, mystery, oh my.

**Notes:** I have no idea where this story is going.  Bear with me, please. ^-^ Also, since I've only seen the TV series and am only 'so-so' familiar with the manga, I take some liberties concerning Meifu and the way it functions.  I try to keep most it true to the manga (in tankoubon 1, the special JuOhCho lessons, Tatsumi does say that Meifu is a replica of Chijou – the Land of the Living) but otherwise I have my way with it.  And, this goes without mentioning, but EnmaCho and JuOhCho and everything confuses the hell out of me, so if I mess something up, again, I am having my way with it and trying to stay as true to the manga and series as possible. ^-^;;

Prologue 

One of the very few luxuries Hisoka had been allowed growing up were books.  He was given dozens of them at a time, so that the few trips his parents made into the cellar were even fewer than usual.  One meal was brought a day.  Twelve books were brought each Sunday, by either his mother or father, while it was a servant that brought him his meals.  They showered him with books to distract his mind from thoughts of escape, but more to keep him from reading the minds of others.  Hisoka read through them as though he thought they would be snatched up at any moment, until they had started to bring him entire boxes of books rather than the usual dozen.

The one certainty he had learned from them was that in stories, there was always a beginning and an end.  Life was the same way.  There was a beginning – that was birth – and there was an end – death.  His life was not like those in the storybooks, much less the real world.  There was a beginning, but no end.  There was not even a resolution in his life.  It continued to flow through time until he wondered where the years had gone and if there was truth in the phrase 'redemption in death.'

Unlike most children, growing up Hisoka had thought often of death and whether or not there was actually an afterlife.  Never in his wildest dreams had he ever imagined that it would be the way it actually was, but he supposed that was the way death was supposed to be.  Death was ambiguous.  No one knew what it felt like to die until it actually happened to them, and though most people had a concept of what would happen following death, none would have thought it turned out to be what it was.

Meifu, the Land of the Dead, was a replica of the real world, with very subtle differences.  Because it was the Land of the Dead, where fantasies and dreams were true, there was no filth, no poverty, no murder, no violence.  There was no building in Meifu that was blemished in any way shape or form.  Trees were always green and laden with leaves.  Flowers were always blooming.  The sun was always shining.  It was a replica of Chijou, the Land of the Living, but it was a much brighter, tranquil, desirable world.

People lived in Meifu as they did in Chijou.  Occupations were accessible, should they be desired, but it was not as though it was necessary.  Each spirit was provided with a home, and while the dead did not need to eat, they were provided with a never-ending supply of food.  It did not function as a natural society, as with a government or with someone in charge of the entire system, as with peaceful, obedient spirits populating Meifu, such things were unnecessary.

Meifu was very peaceful for those that had died and been judged to be righteous, good people, and at times a far better experience than Chijou had been, where they could meet loved ones and live eternally.  For those that were judged as cruel, heartless people, Meifu was another thing entirely.  After all, in the Land of the Dead, there had to be a Heaven (Joukai) and a Hell (Makai), and Meifu had its own functioning Hell.  But Hisoka knew nothing of it, having never been to Makai and knowing only one of its demons, and no one was taught what kind of place Makai was.

And then in Meifu there were people like him.  People that had suffered through their lives and therefore developed an attachment to the world of the living.  This made them candidates to be shinigami, gods of death, that were employed by the Shokan Division of EnmaCho and dealt with bringing the deceased to appear in the court of JuOhCho to be judged and sorted in Meifu.  Because they answered to EnmaDaioh, those in EnmaCho were the highest ranking individuals in all of Meifu, but paid very little.

It had taken more than a week for Hisoka to completely comprehend, and he was still certain that there was something that he was missing.  The system, however, was actually no concern of his so long as he functioned as a shinigami and did what was expected of him.  It was not the system he was thinking about anyway, as he stood beneath one of the many blooming sakura trees outside of Meifu's replica of the Diet Building, where EnmaCho made its headquarters.  He was thinking about books, and how in them, there was always a beginning and an end.

Dying and becoming a shinigami had been the beginning of his story.  It had continued when he had met his current partner, Tsuzuki Asato, and they had worked on their first case together.  The stage of their chaotic play, as Muraki would have said, was set at that time.  The first act had ended and led them into the second, which Hisoka supposed, in terms of a story, would have been considered a subplot because it did not deal entirely with the one man who would become their most loathed enemy.  The third act was when they had met that man again, when Muraki Kazutaka had been behind all of the murders taking place on the Queen Camellia, a luxury liner.  The fourth and most recent of acts was Kyoto, when a marginal resolution had been reached, but there was no ending.

His story continued, and there seemed to be no end in the near future.  Muraki continued to live.  Their hopes that Tsuzuki had been able to kill him were crushed when Hisoka had revealed to them his body still marked by the blood-red characters of the curse Muraki had placed on him.  Without Muraki dead, Hisoka did not think that there was a definite ending to their story.  For there to be an end, like in all of the storybooks, Muraki had to die.  It was a classic tale; good triumphing over evil.  He wanted his story to be the same.

Maybe it could be considered bloodthirsty or morbid of him to want one man's death so badly.  But he felt justified in his desire.  Muraki had tortured him, cursed him, and eventually been the one to murder him.  He had kept Hisoka hanging on a slender thread of life for those three years that he was cursed, not knowing what had happened that evening when he had been unfortunate enough to find Muraki murdering someone.  That was what had damned him.  A mistake.  A step away from his normal path when he was allowed outside for his late night walks.  If he had kept to the same path, if he had not looked toward that red moon, he would have never seen anything.

Still, he wondered if it was better that he had died.  In Chijou, he had been alone, without a single person in the world that cared for him.  His days were spent trapped in the basement of the home he had once shared with his parents.  His evenings were dark, dismal, and ultimately led to tragedy when he was allowed outdoors.  Maybe it was better that he was dead and had escaped from that hell of life.  Here, there were people that cared for him.  He had a family here.  That had never been something accessible to him in that life.

But life was /not/ any easier as a shinigami than it had been as a human.  As a shinigami, he was forced to constantly face death in the eye and to cope with the deaths of others, and not even the natural deaths that JuOhCho was able to supervise without the help of the shinigami.  What he saw were murders and people forced to live horrible lives, people that had been possessed by the dark side of life, people without a hope.  He understood now that he had seen the world with the eyes of a shinigami why Tsuzuki was often upset and felt guilt for what he did as a shinigami.

Only two weeks since it had all happened, he thought with a sigh.  Tsuzuki was still in the infirmary.  Wounds of a shinigami healed much more quickly than those of a human, but because his wounds, a variety of burns, had been caused by a shikigami with the power to kill a shinigami, it would take longer for him to fully recuperate.  Everyone in the agency went to visit him every day.  His spirits were beginning to perk up, especially when they brought with them various treats of cake and pie, but Hisoka could tell that he was still more than slightly damaged.  It would take him a long time to completely overcome what had happened in Kyoto, and even then, Hisoka knew he would never forget.

Tatsumi had told him only yesterday that if Tsuzuki wanted to forget that he would.  Tsuzuki /wanted/ to remember, Tatsumi had said, because only then would he recall past mistakes and know he never wanted to commit such a sin again.  Hisoka did not know whether or not that was healthy, but it was one of Tsuzuki's wishes that he would not go against, and Tatsumi and Watari certainly would say nothing.  They believed what was right was to allow a person to do as they wished, even if that meant their own death or coming undone.  Hisoka disagreed.

Maybe it was selfish of him.  No one had said they thought he was selfish for what he had done, and he sensed no feeling from anyone that would have labeled him as such.  But he had to wonder whether or not he had been acting selfishly.  The death of the girl Tsuzuki had sworn to protect, the needless deaths of so many others; he had wanted to escape the pain of immortal life and die.  He had wanted Touda to destroy him.  But Hisoka had stopped him, on perhaps had stopped him on a selfish whim.  At that moment he had thought of nothing but Tsuzuki's safety and what life would be like if there was no Tsuzuki.  What his mind had come up with was almost too much to bear.  He /had/ to stop him.

And so he did, and because of Tatsumi rescuing them, respecting Hisoka's wish above Tsuzuki's, they were still alive today.  Tsuzuki did not think he had been acting selfishly.  In fact, he was the same cheerful, bubbly person he had always been, and had no regrets for not having been consumed by Touda's flames.  Yet Hisoka continued to wonder if what he had done had been right.  He wondered if, even though Tsuzuki was happy now, he would have been happier if he were dead.

Dead was an interesting term to use, considering all shinigami were already dead, Hisoka realized.  He supposed it still meant the same to them as it did to any normal person.  Dead was in fact dead to them.  A shinigami's life was immortal.  They were essentially given a second chance at life and able to walk amongst the living, but unable to walk amongst the other dead in Meifu outside of JuOhCho.  If Tsuzuki had been consumed by Touda's flames, he would have died and gone to Meifu, and Hisoka would have never seen him again unless he too were to die as a shinigami.

"Thinking too much will give you wrinkles."

Hisoka turned.  Tsuzuki stood beneath the shade of a sakura tree, dressed in a robe beneath his dark trench coat that was tossed casually around his shoulders.  He was smiling, that usual crooked smile of his that constantly graced his attractive features.  Hisoka did not think he knew anyone that smiled nearly as much as Tsuzuki did.

"Baka," he said softly, his words coming out on a sigh.  "That's just an old wives tale."

Tsuzuki laughed softly.  "Well, maybe," he agreed.

He slipped out from beneath the shelter of the sakura tree to come stand beside Hisoka's side, overlooking the lake that stretched out beside the replicated Diet Building.  In Chijou, there was no lake near the Diet Building, much less all of these sakura trees.  That was another of the subtle differences between Meifu and Chijou.

"I thought you might be hungry," Tsuzuki said as he approached, and Hisoka resisted the urge to wince.  What Tsuzuki thought was suitable food made him retch.  He did not have nearly as large of a sweet tooth as his partner did, and if it was something that Tsuzuki had made himself, that was almost worse than death.

Surprisingly, what Tsuzuki offered him was neither sweets, nor something he had attempted to make on his own.  It was just a simple sandwich, one that Wakaba had most likely put together, since the men around the agency were always complaining about stomachaches and never getting any food.  She made the sandwiches to shut them up.

Taking it from Tsuzuki, Hisoka murmured quietly, "Thanks."

Tsuzuki shrugged and smiled at him.  He always had a smile ready for Hisoka.

Hisoka settled down on the grass to nibble at the sandwich.  It was actually quite good, and as he took a few more generous bites, he realized how hungry he actually was.  He couldn't exactly recall the last time he had eaten anything.  Most of his time was spent in the infirmary with Tsuzuki, and whenever food was brought there, it was specially catered to Tsuzuki's tastes.  He had only come outside because Konoe and Tatsumi had usurped the room Tsuzuki was staying in him to discuss how much longer he would be out of field duty, and then lost track of the time.  Tsuzuki must have come out to look for him.

"You shouldn't be wandering around," he reprimanded, his tone not sharp, much less very forceful.  "Tatsumi-san and Kachou want you to rest."

"I'm tired of sitting around in bed," Tsuzuki complained.  "It's so bor~ing."

He flopped down on the grass beside Hisoka.  The younger shinigami spared a glance at him.  It /had/ been two weeks, after all.  Tsuzuki was no longer as condemned to bed as he had been previously, and from the looks of things, his wounds had all disappeared.  Konoe and Tatsumi simply wanted to be absolutely sure that he was at the peak of health before they allowed him to leave the infirmary and go home, however.  And even then, Hisoka doubted he would be allowed on field duty.

"Why aren't you working, Hisoka?" Tsuzuki asked curiously.

Hisoka swallowed the last of his sandwich before responding, as he did possess more manners than Tsuzuki did when it came to gobbling down cake.  "I don't have a partner," he answered pointedly.

"They could have assigned you to someone else for awhile."

"Terakuma and Wakaba are taking care of our block, so I guess it wasn't necessary to make me work with someone else while you're out of commission."

"Guess so . . ."

Hisoka knew that Tsuzuki realized the reason that he was not working was because Konoe and Tatsumi thought that his being in Tsuzuki would help him in recovery, more mentally than it would physically.  Hisoka did not know whether or not it was working.  On the outside, Tsuzuki was the same as always, always smiling and still with his usual bright and cheerful nature, but on the inside Hisoka had no idea.  He had built up walls around himself to prevent Hisoka from knowing his feelings and suffering from them as he did, which Hisoka was honestly grateful for.  But not right now, when he could not tell whether or not Tsuzuki was hurting or anything.

"Feeling better?" Tsuzuki asked, looking at him with a sudden bright smile.  It took Hisoka a moment to realize to what he was referring to.

"Oh, yeah," he answered.  "Thanks.  I really was hungry."

Tsuzuki continued to smile at him for a moment, until Hisoka began to wonder if there was something on his face, but eventually Tsuzuki gave a shrug and looked away.  Locking his hands behind his head, he fell back against the grass, stretching out comfortably.  His eyes slid closed.

"It's really nice out here," he said thoughtfully.

"It always is," Hisoka replied.  Like everywhere in Meifu (specifically, in Joukai), this place was never plagued with weather storms like Chijou was.  It did, however, snow periodically, but even then it was never cold and the sakura blossoms never died.

"I think I'll take a nap here," Tsuzuki announced, and he gave a huge yawn to reaffirm the statement.

"Tatsumi-san would come out and scold us both," Hisoka replied.

"Aa, yeah," Tsuzuki laughed.  "He'd tell me I'd get a cold."

Tatsumi always said things like that, but it was because he cared for Tsuzuki and worried about him.  Hisoka knew that, and he thought that Tsuzuki realized as well.  Tatsumi was not exactly very subtle in showing how he much he favored Tsuzuki.

Hisoka almost felt threatened.  It was a strange feeling.  He knew somewhere in his mind that it was a blind threat, that Tatsumi would take from him what he had with Tsuzuki (whatever that was, he mentally reminded himself), but it was a thought in his mind all the same.  Childish jealousies and fears, he supposed.

"Come on," Hisoka said, standing up and dusting off the sakura petals that had fallen to dot along his pants and shoulders.  He offered a hand to Tsuzuki to help him up.  Tsuzuki took it gratefully and fell into step beside him as they wandered toward the Diet Building.

"Ne, Hisoka."

"Yeah?"

"Thanks for staying with me."

Hisoka could feel his cheeks tingeing slightly red as Tsuzuki said those words.  He said them so honestly and openly, his tone completely serious and expressing how much it had meant to him with ease.  Hisoka felt embarrassed for some reason.

"Idiot," he muttered, "it's nothing."

Tsuzuki just smiled at him, and Hisoka could feel the blush spreading across his face.

Tatsumi had his nose buried in the company budget when they entered the building, making it possible for them to sneak past without the man feeling the need to scold them for being outside when Tsuzuki should have been resting.  Watari was occupied in his lab as well, and he was currently too involved in whatever concoction he was creating to take notice of them, otherwise he would have been very cheerfully pointing out the blush on Hisoka's cheeks.

Tsuzuki slung his jacket over the back of a chair and climbed back into bed where he belonged obediently enough.  Hisoka had only needed to remind him two times before he had given in.  He did not, however, rest as he should have been doing, instead choosing to root around beneath the bed before he came up with a white package.  With a more than smug smirk, he settled the box on his lap and opened it to reveal one of the many cakes Wakaba had smuggled in for him.  Hisoka sighed.

"Someday your teeth will fall out," he said, settling into the chair where Tsuzuki's jacket lay.

Tsuzuki was far too involved with shoveling it into his mouth before Tatsumi or Watari caught him to notice.  Hisoka rolled his eyes heavenward.

"You're going to choke."

Fortunately, Tsuzuki did not choke on his cake, nor was he discovered before he had finished it.  The box was tossed aside into a trash can, and with a contented sigh, he settled back against the comfortable feather pillows.

"I think tomorrow they'll let me go," he said.  "And in another week I'll be working again."  He glanced at Hisoka and smiled.  "I'm actually kinda eager to get back to work."

"Tch.  You'll be eager for all of five minutes before something else gets your attention."

"Naa, Hisoka, you're so mean . . ."

Hisoka of course didn't mean it; he was simply teasing Tsuzuki.  He gave a mock exasperated sigh.

"Go to sleep, Tsuzuki."

"Yes sir.  You'll stay for awhile?"

Hisoka nodded, not needing to reaffirm that with words.  He almost always did stay, even if it was not necessary for him to.  Tsuzuki slept well enough and never woke up needing anyone's assistance.  Hisoka supposed he stayed simply because his presence being there helped Tsuzuki fall asleep to begin with.

Tsuzuki drew up the sheets around him and settled down to sleep.  Hisoka flipped out the light and returned to the chair he had previously occupied, taking Tsuzuki's jacket from where it was slung over the back to tug it over and around him.  Once Tsuzuki's breathing had become even as he drifted away, Hisoka closed his eyes as well, content to listen to him and nothing else.

Death made memories of life at best hazy images of a past long forgotten.  Dreams made those images vivid, real, and true.  Hisoka's dreams played out before him like a cinema screen.  He was the audience member, watching his past as it played out before him.  The moving screen was always in black and white in his dreams, and the image was always clouded over, making it difficult to see true landmarks or where he was.  The only thing that stood out clearly were the faces of people in his dreams.

The dream was more vivid than ever this time.  He was seated, actually seated, in the middle of a movie theatre and watching as one of his memories played out before him.  He was only seven in the memory.  His mother, a petite woman, golden of hair and pale of eyes was in the image.  They were seated together, and what appeared at best to be a restaurant.  His mother was speaking to him, but his attention seemed to be caught elsewhere, by something else.

"People shouldn't fight in public," his mother said suddenly, irritably, referring to a couple not far from them that were engaged in a very loud, very obvious battle.  His mother took a sip of her tea.  "I wonder what's got them so worked up."

Hisoka knew.

"The man slept with another woman," the seven-year-old version of him said quietly.  "The woman is upset with him because of that."

"How do you know what?" his mother asked, surprised.  "Did you overhear them say that?"

"No.  I just know."

His mother frowned.  "Boys who lie go to bad places, Hisoka," she said reprimandingly.

"But I'm not lying!  He really did, and she's really upset with him because of it."

"Of course.  And I suppose you can tell me what that man's thinking."

His mother made a distant gesture with her hand.  Hisoka looked to where she was pointing him toward, finding a man talking in hushed, angry tones to another man, much younger than he.

"He's really angry," he answered, "because the waiter stole from the machine . . ."

His mother paled slightly.

"You're scaring me."

"You're not happy either, are you, Mama?  Why do you cry at night?"

"Hisoka, stop."

"Did Dad do something?"

"Hisoka, stop!"

  
"Mama?"

"Stop it, Hisoka!  Stop it!"__

"Stop, Hisoka!"

He snapped awake.  Tsuzuki was leaning across the bed, shaking him by the shoulders.  His eyes were filled with concern.  Hisoka wondered what was wrong, then realized rather numbly that he was whimpering.  He had been dreaming again and talking in his sleep.  Tsuzuki had woken him up.

"I-I . . . sorry," he murmured.  "Bad dream . . ."

"Are you okay?" Tsuzuki asked.  "You sounded like you were crying."

Hisoka shook himself, coming back to his senses.  "Just a bad dream," he repeated, tone firmer this time.  Tsuzuki flinched back, as though wounded.

"Okay."

". . . sorry, Tsuzuki.  For worrying you."

Tsuzuki recovered and smiled brightly.  "It's okay.  Have bad dreams often?"

"Not really," Hisoka answered, and that was the truth.  He had them occasionally enough, like any person, but not constantly.  And they were never so bad that he woke up crying or genuinely upset, no different than he was now.  He was simply shaken, having not been expecting being torn from the dream by Tsuzuki.

"Didn't mean to wake you," he said apologetically.

"Eh," Tsuzuki said, grinning.  "No big deal.  You should get into bed.  Sleeping in a chair isn't good for your posture," he added pointedly, sounding very much like Tatsumi and earning a small smile from Hisoka.

The younger shinigami climbed obediently into the bed beside the one Tsuzuki occupied, keeping Tsuzuki's jacket in his grip and using it as a blanket rather than the actual sheets.  He felt more comforted when it was Tsuzuki's jacket.  It smelt like his older partner, and for some reason, that set him at ease and made him feel safe and secure.

"Okay now, Hisoka?" Tsuzuki asked.  He was lying on his side, hand against his cheek and elbow propped up on the mattress.

"I'm okay," Hisoka answered.

Tsuzuki yawned.  "Good.  Good night, Hisoka."

"'night, Tsuzuki."


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes: **Usually, I try not to use too much Japanese, considering that I'm writing in English, after all.  Not that I have much comprehension of Japanese anyway.  But when it comes to something a person would call another affectionately, as in the case of a girl calling an older brother oniichan, I keep it as oniichan.  In this case, when Tsuzuki refers to his older sister, he always calls her 'neesan.'

This part mentions that Hisoka is familiar with kendo, aikido, kyudo, naginata, and judo, and I kept those as is too since they are technically an art.  _Kendo_, of course, is swordsmanship or fencing.  _Aikido_, from all I can understand, is some kind of way of harmony with the universe (O.o;;).  _Kyudo_ is Japanese archery; _naginata_ is a long sword or halberd, so I assume that means he's familiar with that weapon.  Lastly, I'm not very sure on a literal translation of _judo_, but if it means the martial arts form, that'd be the art of throwing or something. *sweatdrop* Er, don't hold me to that.  In any case, I read that he knows these from a thorough character profile of him, so I suspect they're correct.

Also, though this story is said to be a continuation of the TV series, I've included parts of the manga that was excluded from the TV series.  So basically, you could say it's a continuation from the Kyoto stage of the manga, if you want to be technical. ^^

Yami no Kenzoku Chapter One 

The triumphant return of Tsuzuki to work as a shinigami and to field duty was celebrated with a pair of cheesecakes, courtesy of Wakaba.  Tsuzuki devoured a good four pieces until he actually thought to push the wonderful dessert away.  The others – which included Konoe-kachou, Tatsumi, Watari, the Gushoshin, Terazuma, Wakaba, and of course Hisoka – ate much more modestly than the overenthusiastic shinigami.  The return was as well celebrated with a new assignment for he and Hisoka, which for once in his life, Tsuzuki was actually eager to get started on.

"I think we've wasted enough time for one day," Tatsumi began, but he smiled warmly at Tsuzuki, showing very clearly to all of them that he wasn't very disappointed about losing work time.  Which was, like Tsuzuki being eager to work, a once in a lifetime feeling for him.  He was simply as relieved as any of them that Tsuzuki was all right and in fine spirits at that.

Tsuzuki sprouted his well-known puppy ears and tail.  "One more piece of cheesecake?" he begged, the effect of sad puppy eyes coming off quite well considering.

"You'll explode if you eat anymore," Hisoka said pointedly.

The puppy ears drooped.  "Maybe," Tsuzuki agreed, his paw sliding away from the last piece of cake.  He knew that he had already had more than his share, or otherwise he might have argued the point further.

"Poor Tsuzuki-san," Wakaba said sympathetically, reaching over to pat him on the head.  "I'll make you some cookies later, okay?"

The ears perked up and the tail began wagging at a mile a second.  "Wai!  Sankyuu, Wakaba-chan!"

Konoe cleared his throat.  Taking his meaning, the girls shuffled out of the room to leave the men to their meeting to discuss this new assignment Tsuzuki and Hisoka were being given.  Wakaba took with her the remains of the cheesecake, much to Tsuzuki's displeasure, but once they were gone he sobered up and dedicated his attention to Konoe.

"There seems to be some kind of disturbance happening in Nagasaki," Konoe began.  "We don't know much about it right now, but students have been dying more and more frequently.  So far two have died in the past two months in a single school, and we think there's reason to believe there's some outside force causing the deaths."

"Well, how are the kids dying?" Tsuzuki asked.  

Hisoka glanced at him sidelong, wondering whether or not he was uncomfortable with this information.  Tsuzuki suffered all the same no matter what it was that they were assigned to do, but when it was young people involved, he tended to take it more to heart than usual.  But with Tsuzuki blocking him, he couldn't tell what the older shinigami was thinking.

"There's nothing to lead us to believe that it's murder," Konoe replied, "and there's no reason for us to think that it's illness.  When autopsies were done, there was nothing wrong with them at all.  Everything was in perfect working order and not a single blemish to make us suspect whether or not it was foul play."

"We have reason to suspect that it will happen for a third time, quite likely in the same school system," Tatsumi added.

"So we're to find out what's causing the deaths and then prevent it from happening again," Tsuzuki confirmed.

"Correct."

Tsuzuki flashed a smile.  "Well, that shouldn't be too hard, ne, Hisoka?"

Hisoka was seated across from him, arms folded across his chest, head bowed and eyes closed.  He glanced up as Tsuzuki spoke to him, a sour look overcoming his expression.

"Shouldn't be too hard?" he repeated.  "With /that/ much information they should've just thrown us into a haystack and told us to find the needle."

Tsuzuki frowned slightly; Hisoka seemed more and more distant as of late.  He had become inured to the abrasive demeanor of his younger partner, but more and more often lately it seemed that Hisoka was even more short-tempered than was usual and quick to make a biting remark.  The others had noticed it as well, but no one had approached him to ask what was wrong.  Incidents in the past of having done so and receiving a very cold rebuttal kept them from trying.

"We don't expect you two to crack this case in a day or two," Tatsumi put in.  "But we do think you are the most qualified for the job."

Tsuzuki brightened up considerably at this compliment.  "But of course," he said, puffing up and appearing rather smug.

"Here's what information we do have," Konoe said, holding out a manila folder to Tsuzuki, "as well as your covers while you're on Chijou."

"Let me guess," Hisoka sighed.  "I'm the student."

Tatsumi smiled that smile that was more inclined toward a smirk.

"Naturally."

"Naturally," Hisoka repeated, tugging irritably at the collar of his new school uniform.

Tsuzuki smiled at him.  "Cheer up.  It could be worse."

"Easy for you to say.  You get to pretend to be a nurse again and spend all day doing nothing but chowing down while I do all of the real work."

"I work!" Tsuzuki exclaimed, indignant at the abuse.  "You forget I'm an elite shinigami."

Hisoka sighed and looked away.  Elite was one way to put it, he supposed.  Tsuzuki was, after all, the single most skilled and powerful of all of EnmaCho's shinigami, though no one would have thought it looking at him.  But, Hisoka reminded himself, Tsuzuki had not turned out to be the slacker that Hisoka had thought him to be when he had first met him.  Tsuzuki was the kind of person that gave new meaning to the phrase 'don't judge a book by its cover.'

His gaze turned to regard the school where the disturbances had been taking place.  It seemed familiar to him somehow, as though he had been here once before, and not that long ago at all.  He frowned slightly to himself and searched his memory.  Unfortunately, nothing came to him.

"Tsuzuki, have we been here before?" he asked.

Tsuzuki scratched thoughtfully at the back of his head, a nervous habit he possessed.  "I think so.  It was awhile ago, wasn't it?"  He paused and considered for another moment before suddenly he became more animated, smiling and snapping his fingers as realization dawned on him.

"This is Hijiri's school!" he exclaimed triumphantly.

"Hijiri," Hisoka repeated in a quite voice.

Minase Hijiri was the prodigious young violinist he and Tsuzuki had met on only the third or fourth case they had worked on together.  It had turned out to be one of their worse when a demon of Makai had been involved in the entire ordeal.  Hisoka wondered whether or not Hijiri had something to do with what was happening at the school now.

"He can probably help us figure this out quicker," Tsuzuki said, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket and continuing down the path they were taking in direction of the school.  Hisoka hastened his steps to catch up with him.

"We shouldn't involve him," he said, a little breathlessly.  Tsuzuki oftentimes forgot that he had to take much longer strides to keep up with those Tsuzuki took naturally.  "Not after what happened last time," he added, not meaning to hurt Tsuzuki by saying so, but making a known fact clear.  There would only be more trouble the more people involved.

"Aa, maybe not," Tsuzuki replied.  "It'd be nice to see him again anyway."

Perking up, Tsuzuki whirled on Hisoka and said cheerfully, "Let me see your schedule!"

Hisoka, startled at his sudden change in demeanor, took a moment to recover and pass along the schedule to Tsuzuki.  The older shinigami looked it over skeptically for a few moments, nodding to himself and murmuring a few things under his breath as he did so, not to mention narrowly avoiding walking into telephone poles as they continued along the pathway.  Hisoka had to keep steering him back to the right direction.

"They're got some weird classes these days," Tsuzuki said, frowning thoughtfully and passing it back to him.

"Not really," Hisoka shrugged.  He tucked the paper back into the front pocket of his uniform jacket.  "Same courses that I was taught."  

He didn't say the same courses that he had been taught at school, because he had never attended private nor public school.  Elementary school was one thing, but his ability as an empath had been discovered when he was seven years old.  The remainder of his education as taught through the few books and worksheets his parents would give him.

"I never went to school," Tsuzuki said, as though he knew what Hisoka was thinking.  "My sister taught me."

"I didn't know you had a sister."

"Aa.  My neesan.  She died when I was a kid."

"I'm sorry."

Tsuzuki grinned.  "It's been seventy years.  I'm over it.  She wouldn't want me to keep being upset about it anyway.  Ah, here we are."

They had arrived at the school entrance.  The morning bell had already rung, which meant that Hisoka would be late for his first class, but he didn't particularly mind.  It was not as though he intended to learn anything here.  Once he and Tsuzuki had solved the case, he would leave the school and disappear from the memories of all those that attended there.  Oftentimes memories were completely erased, less someone become suspicious of a boy coming to school and attending for only a month at the most, but for the majority of the time that procedure was unnecessary.

"Why didn't they tell us it was happening at Hijiri's school?"  Hisoka voiced his curiosity as they entered the building.  Students were disappearing into their classrooms, leaving Tsuzuki and Hisoka to walk the halls in private.

"I guess they didn't think it was that suspicious," Tsuzuki answered with a shrug.  "I doubt it's got anything to do with Hijiri."

"But he . . ."

"That demon is dead," Tsuzuki said firmly.  "So it can't have anything to do with Hijiri or Saagantanasu.  It's just coincidence."

Hisoka wondered whether or not Tsuzuki was right.  It could have been coincidence; that was true.  However, it could /not/ be coincidence and there could possibly be a connection to Hijiri somehow in this case.  The how was what Hisoka had no idea about.  When they had departed from Hijiri, the case had been solved and everything laid to rest.  They had made sure there was no chance of anything happening to Hijiri again.

"Better get to class, Hisoka," Tsuzuki said, turning to him with a smile.  They had arrived at the infirmary.  Tatsumi had already taken care of the school's full-time doctor, giving him a rather extended vacation as long as Tsuzuki needed a cover.  The man was probably off playing golf blissfully somewhere.

"Whatever," Hisoka muttered below his breath.

Tsuzuki reached out and ruffled his hair.  "Do good and come have lunch with me!" he said cheerfully.  "And when you get study period too.  I'll help!"

". . . you?"

"Me," Tsuzuki said proudly.

"I'll fail."

Tsuzuki deflated.  "Waaaaai, Hi-so-kaaaa, you're so mean . . ."

Hisoka sighed.  He had never thought he had ever been more bored in his entire life.

He would have found the subject material the monotone voice was droning on about more interesting if he did not know the material inside and out.  History was one of many subjects he excelled at, as a good many of the books he had read growing up dealt with the history of the world.  When not reading a history of the world, he was reading the history of specific countries, and then of specific areas, and then of specific cities.  He had a feeling he knew more than this teacher could ever hope to comprehend in his entire lifetime, and that was not an arrogant thought on his part.  It was the truth.

He wondered absently what Tsuzuki was doing.  Probably catching a nap or eating cake or something like that.  Tsuzuki had it easier than he did, posing as a nurse as opposed to a student.  But Tsuzuki always had it that way, and Hisoka was realizing more and more often that he would forever be the one posing as a student.

He was only sixteen, not including any death years, since he had not even been dead for a full year but only the span of several months.  But what happened when four years passed in the afterlife, and he would be twenty years old?  He would still have the appearance of a sixteen-year-old boy.  Same blonde hair, same innocent eyes, and the same painfully thin frame.  Someday, he supposed he might consider it a blessing, when he was as old as Tsuzuki was in afterlife years, but right now he found it infuriating.

The bell rang, announcing the end of class and beginning of lunch.  Hisoka gathered his books together and more than gratefully left the classroom.  He headed in the direction of the staircase to join Tsuzuki in the infirmary, but with his inevitable bad luck, the moment he turned around the corner to start down the stairs he had collided with a girl coming up.

On instinct, Hisoka reached out and caught the girl by the wrist before she could fall backward and down the long flight of stairs.  Her books, however, where knocked out of her arms and fell the distance.

"Are you all right?" Hisoka asked.

She looked up at him, having been watching disappointedly as her books bounced down the stairs to notice her savior.  A bright smile illuminated her young, attractive features.  She reminded him of Saya, one of the two pieces to the ninth block partnership in Hokkaido.  Same eye shape, same shape of face, but the eye and hair color was wrong.  Saya had blue eyes and blonde hair, but this girl had brown eyes and auburn hair.

"I'm fine," she said.  "You?  I didn't mean to slam into you like that."

"No, I'm okay," Hisoka said.  He started down the steps, retrieved the girl's books, and brought them back to her, playing the part of a perfect gentleman.  "Here you go."

She rewarded him with another smile.  "Thanks!  Most people would've just kept on walking.  I haven't seen you around.  Are you the new transfer student?"

"A-aa," Hisoka confirmed, a little surprised at how quickly news was passed around the school.  "I'm Kurosaki Hisoka."

"Iida Yuanyi," the girl said, holding out her hand to him.  "Nice to meet'cha.  Are you on lunch break now, Hisoka-kun?"

"Yeah . . ."

Hisoka was somewhat bewildered.  He did not think he could ever recall a person being so enthusiastic to merely meeting him, but that was not including Yuma and Saya.  Not that he wanted to include them anyway.  They had frightened him to death.  Yuanyi was simply being remarkably kind for having just met him, which surprised him.

"Same here," Yuanyi said, starting down the stairs.  Hisoka followed, assuming that was what she expected him to do.  "You can sit with my friends and I, if you'd like.  I know what it's like being a new student.  Not much fun to be all alone."

"Oh . . . ah, thanks, but I was going to . . ."

"Go to the library and sit lunch out, I bet!" Yuanyi said, flashing him another bright smile.  It was a smile that rivaled Tsuzuki.  "Well, if you /really/ want to, I won't stop you."

Hisoka frowned slightly.  They were approaching the infirmary now.  Tsuzuki would be disappointed if he did not come like he had promised, but he had the chance now to learn more about the deaths of the two students if he were to go to lunch and overhear their conversations.  Since it was work related, he was sure Tsuzuki would forgive him.

"I'll come," he said.  "Thanks."

"Not a problem," Yuanyi said, still smiling.  "Come on, cafeteria's this way."

Before Hisoka even knew what had happened, Yuanyi had dragged him through the lunch line, filled up his tray with some rather health-harming substances, and then sat him down at one of the many round tables across the cafeteria beside her.  The next thing he knew she was introducing him to all of her friends, boys and girls alike, and he caught all of two names before he gave up on trying to remember at all.

"So where did you transfer from, Hisoka-kun?" one of the girls asked him.  Dark eyes, dark hair, not quite as attractive as Yuanyi, but Yuanyi struck him as the kind of person that accepted all people alike, no matter what their appearance or background was.  The group of people around him being a rather odd assortment confirmed that thought in his mind.

"Kyoto," he answered off the top of his head.  "My father's job moved him to Nagasaki."

"Do you play any sports?" a boy, Kensou, inquired.

"I . . . er, well I fence," Hisoka answered.  "And some other stuff . . ."

Sports had not been amongst the things his father had thought was proper for a boy to learn, a boy that was to be the future head of their family at that.  He had been taught kendo, aikido, kyudo, naginata, and judo aside from what education he already had.  Sports had not been on the curriculum.

"What else?" another girl asked curiously.

"Judo . . . kyudo--"

"Kyudo!" Yuanyi interrupted.  "You should go out for the school archery team!  Are you any good?"

That was a rather stupid question, Hisoka thought.  "Yeah, pretty good," was what he answered modestly however.

"Akira is on the archery team," Yuanyi said, pointing to a boy that was seated with them.  Akira smiled.

"I could introduce you to the coach," he said.  "We've been needing some new archers or else we can't go to the district championship.  If you're free after school, you can come to the practice."

Hisoka was startled into responding with a lame, "O-okay . . ." before the others decided to let him be to have his lunch while they went on to talk about other things.

He was honestly . . . surprised, he supposed the word was.  He had never had people be this open and accepting to him before.  Even Tsuzuki, the one person that seemed to have a smile for the entire world, had been difficult to accept him in the beginning.  It was Hisoka's fault entirely for that as well, which was why he was so startled that these people accepted him without hardly knowing him at all.  He had done nothing to make them like him, yet they were making a genuine effort to be kind and involve him in their activities.  It was a strange feeling he couldn't quite identify that these people had.

The end of lunch bell rang.  Everyone hopped up and began to gather their things.  As they drifted away, each said good-bye to Hisoka in turn, which succeeded in dumbfounding him only more.  At last only he, Yuanyi, and Akira remained.

"What class do you have now, Hisoka?" Akira asked.

Hisoka looked quickly at his schedule.  "Um . . .advanced algebra," he answered.

"Advanced?" Akira repeated, surprised.  "You've got to have some real smarts to be in that class.  Yuanyi's got it too.  Even if she does have that pretty face, she's a real nerd on the inside."

"Shut up!" Yuanyi exclaimed.  Her cheeks flamed red and she reached out to thwap Akira upside the head.  Sticking her nose in the air, she turned her back to him.  "You just go on to your language lessons, ne?  I hear your English is something awful."

Akira stuck his tongue out at her, which Yuanyi returned with an equally disgusting face.  But as Akira departed from them both were smiling.  Hisoka had never had friends before.  He supposed that was what it was like, to have a friend.

"Come on, Hisoka-kun," Yuanyi said suddenly, tugging on his hand, "or we'll be late for algebra!"

"So last period turned out to be self-study, huh?"

Hisoka glanced up.  Tsuzuki wheeled around in his chair, pinning a smile on him.

He was dressed the part for a school nurse, of course.  White jacket over a suit, glasses perched on his nose, stethoscope around his neck.  Hisoka thought he almost enjoyed the part too much.

"Yeah," he answered, slipping inside the infirmary and shutting the door behind him.  "Sorry I didn't come for lunch.  I got distracted."

"That's okay," Tsuzuki said, still smiling.  "Did you find anything out?"

Hisoka settled down on the bed in the corner of the room, placing his books beside him.  He had been given a load of homework despite the fact that it had technically been his first day.  If he paid the Gushoshin enough, he wondered if they would do it for him.

"No," he replied.  "For two kids dying here recently everybody's really . . . nice and happy."

"Well, maybe the Gushoshin or somebody else found something out to give us a hint in the right direction," Tsuzuki said optimistically.

Tsuzuki stood up and stretched.  "Well," he continued, "we might as well head to the hotel Tatsumi booked us since you're all done."

"Ah . . ."

Tsuzuki turned and blinked.  "Hm?"

"I sort of promised this person I'd stay after for the archery practice . . . they want me to be on the team, and I don't know, I just said okay . . ."

Hisoka ducked his head.  Tsuzuki was looking at him in that odd way of his again, looking a cross between puzzled and amused.  Finally amused won out and a huge smile spread across his face.

"That's great!  You really should try to get on the team.  You're a really good archer."

"Y . . . you think so?"

"Of course!  And I'm glad you're making friends."

Hisoka's cheeks flushed bright red.  "It's not really like that . . ."

"Waaaaai, can I stay to watch?  Or are old men not allowed?"

"…….idiot."

Yuanyi and Akira were waiting for him on the field when Hisoka and Tsuzuki emerged from the building.  Tsuzuki gave him a smile and told him to do his best, then disappeared to the stands to watch the practice.  Feeling the same blush on his cheeks, Hisoka made his way across the field with his head bowed and praying that the flush went away before he reached Yuanyi and Akira.

Akira was dressed in a school P.E. uniform while Yuanyi had changed out of her uniform into something more comfortable.  There were a few other people he recognized from lunch seated in the stands, but aside from those few, he did not recognize anyone.  He made a mental note in his mind to remember that he was here to /work/, not to make friends or waste his time on archery.  All of this was a part of work, nothing else.

That, at least, was what he would keep repeating his mind.  Possibly he might come to believe it.

"Who's that guy?" Yuanyi asked, gesturing to Tsuzuki.

Hisoka faltered for some kind of lie to give.  "Oh, he's uh . . ."

"I get it," Yuanyi interrupted, smiling broadly.  "He's way cute.  You bagged a good one."

Hisoka did a double take, just nearly colliding into the ground.  "Tsuzuki and I aren't like that!!"

Yuanyi did not believe him, but she did not continue to tease him.  She simply smiled knowingly to herself and gave Akira a nudge in the side, who nodded in agreement.  Hisoka could feel his blush returning in full force.

"Here, Hisoka," Akira said, holding out a bow and quiver of arrows to him.  "I've already told coach about you and he wants me to evaluate you.  Try to hit that target down there."

At the far end of the field a bright target gleamed at him.  Hisoka tested the string of the bow before settling an arrow onto it.  Drawing it up beside his ear, his eyes narrowed in on the yellow center of the target.  What made him a good shot was that when he focused on something, all other distractions faded away, until all he could see was that yellow circle.  

He released the string without hesitation and the arrow whistled through the air.  The tip embedded into the very center.

"Whoa, you really are good!" Akira exclaimed.

"Way to go, Hisoka-kun!" Yuanyi put in cheerfully.

Hisoka felt himself blushing again.  He tried to make some modest remark to escape their praise, but nothing seemed to come out of his mouth.  He honestly was pleased by their words.

"Hey!  Hey, we need the nurse!"

A voice calling from down field caught their attention.  The three teenager turned to find someone at the far end of the track standing up and waving his arms frantically to catch someone's attention.  Akira dropped his bow and immediately began to spring across the field, and Yuanyi needed only to tug on Hisoka's arm to get him to follow them.

Tsuzuki had also heard the plea for help, Hisoka noted.  He could see his partner approaching from the bleachers as he glanced over at the stands.  Despite the fact that he was posing as the school nurse, he actually knew a thing or two when it came to health issues and actually would be of help.  Hisoka breathed a sigh of relief that he was there and had not gone on to the hotel without him.

"What happened?" Tsuzuki asked as he came closer.

The boy waving his arms gestured to his friend, another boy lying on the ground holding his ankle in hand and moaning in pain.  "We were running around the track, and he tripped over that," he explained, pointing a jagged rock a few yards from them.  "But we checked the track before we started!  I thought we got it out of the way!"

Tsuzuki smiled.  "Don't worry, it's not your fault.  Just let me take a look at him."

The boy moved aside to give him room.  Tsuzuki kneeled down.  Both he and Hisoka nearly gasped at the same moment.

The other boy was Hijiri.

"Tsuzuki?" Hijiri asked, surprised.  "I'm not in so much pain I'm hallucinating, am I?"

"You guys know each other?" asked Yuanyi.

"Ah, let's get him inside," Tsuzuki said quickly.  "You two, go get a stretcher so we can carry him in.  Don't worry, kiddo, you'll be fine."

The fall had caused Hijiri a sprained ankle, fortunately nothing severe.  Once his wound was wrapped and he was given a few painkillers, he was fine and talking quite animatedly in the infirmary.  One by one his friends departed to go on home, sure that he would be fine, until Tsuzuki and Hisoka were left alone with the prodigious violinist.

"I'm really surprised to see you guys," Hijiri said, smiling.  "What're you doing here?  How's Kazusa?  You can see her, can't you?  I mean, since you're well . . . dead and all."

"Shinigami are not allowed to associate with the dead in Meifu," Tsuzuki replied.  "I'm sure Kazusa's doing fine, though."

"Oh.  Well, that's too bad.  But I'm still glad to see you two!"

Tsuzuki smiled.  Hisoka did not.  He was seated in the desk chair, arms folded across his chest and gazing at Hijiri evenly.  Something about the other boy had always bothered him.  Perhaps it was that they were so alike in appearance, yet so different.  Maybe it was because of the way Hijiri looked at Tsuzuki.

_Now I sound like a jealous idiot_ Hisoka thought sourly.

"So why are you here?" Hijiri asked again.

"We were sent here because of the deaths of two students here," Tsuzuki replied.  "Do you know anything about it, Hijiri?"

The boy sobered at once.  "Yeah, of course.  The first to die was a girl named Ikaruga Mai.  Then it was Nagumo Takujii.  Nobody knows how they died.  They just did.  And only in the span of a three weeks.  It's been two weeks since.  There are rumors flying around the next person's going to die soon.  Everybody's afraid it will be them."

"Why do they think it will happen here again?" Hisoka asked.

"Well, because it's strange, isn't it?  Two kids die, both in no way even a doctor can tell, and only in the span of three weeks.  And both came to this school!  It's like we're cursed or something."

"Cursed," Tsuzuki repeated.  "Maybe a curse, but I don't know anyone that could do something like /this/ . . ."  He glanced at Hisoka, knowing what his younger partner was thinking.  "Not even him."

Hisoka resisted the urge to shudder.  "Well, maybe a serial killer or something."

"That's a real talented serial killer," Hijiri said dryly, "to kill people without leaving a trace."

Hisoka fixated a rather foul look on him, which went unnoticed to both he and Tsuzuki.  Hijiri's attention had been caught by Tsuzuki once again, who was pacing back and forth across the room alternating rubbing his chin or scratching at the back of his head.  Hisoka thought again how much he did not like the way Hijiri looked at Tsuzuki.

"Has anything strange been happening around here lately?" Tsuzuki asked.

"Not really," Hijiri replied.

"Anything the people did or acted like or looked like in those weeks before they died?"

"I didn't really know Mai, but Takujii was in orchestra with me.  He didn't act much differently than he always did, but he did get tired a lot more often.  He even passed out once during class.  That was a few days before he died."

"Has anyone had symptoms like that lately?  Getting tired easily?"

"Ummm . . . hey, yeah, one person."

Hisoka looked up.  "Who?"

"Iida Yuanyi."


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes:** According to a currency converter, twenty-five hundred yen is somewhere around two hundred American dollars. ^^

Also, this chapter mentions that Hisoka was trained as a _bushi_.  A bushi is a warrior or samurai, so basically, Hisoka was being trained to be an able fighter.

  
Randomly, if you think this story is moving too quickly, that's actually my intent.  I mean for it to be like the TV series in that way.  Three episodes spent on one case, which in the case of this story, is like three chapters spent on one case.  No worries, though.  Everything ties together in the end.  So it's not like I'm being totally random.

Oh, and I always call fuda ofuda.  Habit from writing X stories.

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Two**

The EnmaCho budget was stretched and strained as far as it could go, but Tsuzuki was of the opinion that Tatsumi could possibly spare another twenty-five hundred yen to offer them a decent hotel to stay in.  The limit of four thousand yen on food was bad enough.  Then he had to make them stay in places like this hotel that Tatsumi had found for them, that looked as though it would fall a part at any moment.

"Tatsumi, you cheapskate," Tsuzuki growled to no one in particular.  

He stood on the balcony of the room he and Hisoka were sharing, leaning against the stone railing and gazing out over the city.  Hisoka was inside, showering.  Since they had spoken to Hijiri this afternoon, he had been more quiet than was usual, and that was saying quite a lot considering it was Hisoka, after all.  

Tsuzuki was worried about him.  He seemed shaken up about something, but he would not come out and say what it was, and Tsuzuki did not want to push him into talking about something he did not want to discuss.

Tsuzuki sighed.  He had been a shinigami for seventy years, perhaps more than that if he bothered to continue to keep counting.  He did not think he had ever encountered a problem quite like his current one.  Information had been scarce on cases before, but they had never sent him out with as little information as they had given him this time.  The only clues he had was that it was teenagers that were plagued by this curse, whatever it was, and that before they died they were often more tired than was natural.  That was two clues too few to go on.

For that matter, he had no idea how he was supposed to prevent further deaths when he did not know what was causing them.  There was nothing he could do when he did not know what caused the deaths, or who it would strike next.  He could follow his instincts and the few hints he had been given, but while doing that, another person might die.

His first case back on the job and they had given him the worst they could come up with, Tsuzuki thought dryly.  They could have given him something simple.  Assisting someone to Meifu, for one.  He missed the days when nothing had been this complicated.

The bathroom door opened and Hisoka emerged, running a towel over his hair.  Tsuzuki pushed away from the balcony railing and slipped inside, closing the glass sliding door behind him.

"Feeling any better?" he asked.

"Wha . . .?"  Hisoka looked startled at the question.  After a moment, he recovered and gave an indifferent shrug of his shoulders.  "I'm fine, Tsuzuki."

Tsuzuki smiled sadly.  No matter what he and Hisoka had gone through together, surviving through everything that had happened in Kyoto, he had not been naïve to think that Hisoka would open up to him completely after the incident.  Hisoka had a troubled past.  It would take more than a single moment in time for him to accept Tsuzuki, and that was fine.  Tsuzuki knew that he needed just as much time to accept Hisoka.

"Just checking," he said, smiling.  "I ordered in Chinese if you're hungry."  He gestured to the table where an assortment of colored food boxes were sitting, a few already open from what he had eaten.  Hisoka made some kind of grateful noise and went over to put at least some kind of substance into his system.

Tsuzuki left him to eat and settled down on one of the full sized beds.  Aside from the remote sounds of Nagasaki night life in the distance, no sound came into the hotel room.  Not even Hisoka made the slightest sound as he was eating.  Normally, Tsuzuki would have cracked under such pressure, but he did not say anything for fear of irritating Hisoka or upsetting him more than he already seemed to be.

He thought again of the few clues they had.  It was a three weeks span of time between each death.  Ikaruga Mai had been the first of the deaths, and three weeks later it was Nagumo Takujii.  Hijiri had said that it was two weeks ago that Takujii had passed away, which meant that whoever the curse had befallen now had another week to live.  Tsuzuki wondered if in that small span of time if he and Hisoka would be able to solve the case and save a person's life.

"Tsuzuki?"

Tsuzuki opened his amethyst eyes wide and glanced over to Hisoka.  "What's up?"

"You know how I said that you shouldn't promise to protect someone?" Hisoka asked slowly.  His hands were folded on the tabletop, his eyes were burning into the wall opposite of him.  "Because if you fail, then it's that much more of a disappointment to both you and the person?"

"I remember," Tsuzuki replied.  It was what Hisoka had told him when he had promised Hijiri that he would protect him.  He had failed in doing so when the demon of Makai had taken control of his body.  Worse, he had also failed to protect Kazusa, and her life had been the cost.

"What if . . . what if it's a person you really don't want to die?"

Tsuzuki sat up.  "I'm not sure I know what you mean."

"Hijiri said that the next person to die might be that girl . . . Iida Yuanyi."  Hisoka's hands tightened visibly on the tabletop.  His knuckles were beginning to turn white.  "She . . . I don't want to let her die.  But I can't promise to protect her, because I don't know how."

"She's one of the friends you made today, huh?"

"I guess so . . ."

  
Tsuzuki stood up.  Hisoka did not notice him as he approached, much less did he even seem to feel it when Tsuzuki settled both hands on his shoulders comfortingly.  He only continued to stare forward at the wall.

"What you should do is try your best," Tsuzuki said.  "Try and protect her, because that's all you really can do.  Don't think of the worse, Hisoka.  We might have this case solved by tomorrow and she'll be fine."

Hisoka sighed.  "You're too optimistic."

"One of us has to be," Tsuzuki said with a laugh, his hands slipping away from Hisoka's shoulders.  "Now get some sleep.  Worrying about it won't do you any good."

"Aa . . . okay, Tsuzuki."

"Hi-so-ka-kun!"

Hisoka found himself being thrown over backwards as a blur of auburn assaulted him.  It took a few moments to untangle their legs and arms, but eventually the person was able to escape from him, and Hisoka found himself looking up into the smiling face of Yuanyi.  Tsuzuki, who had been walking alongside him, looked down at the pair with an amused smile on his face.

"Good morning!" Yuanyi said cheerfully, picking herself up off the ground.  She held out a hand to Hisoka and helped him up as well.  Only then did she seem to notice Tsuzuki, and she quickly turned to him and bowed politely.  "Good morning, sensei."

"Tsuzuki," the older shinigami said with a smile.  "Yuanyi, ne?"

"That's me," she said.  "Ne, ne, will /you/ tell me what's up with Hisoka-kun and you?  Yesterday he got all shy and started stuttering."

Hisoka sputtered out something indecipherable before managing an indignant, "Yuanyi!!"

Tsuzuki laughed.  "I don't know what you're talking about," was all that he would yield, but Hisoka had a feeling that smile of his said far more than his words.

"Come on, Hisoka-kun," Yuanyi said, lacing an arm through his and tugging him along.  "It's only your second day and I still have lots of people I want you to meet.  You don't mind, do you, Tsuzuki-san?"

"Oh, not at all!  He /needs/ some social interaction."

Yuanyi laughed, while Hisoka turned a faint shade of pink, embarrassed by their teasing.  "I'll be sure to get him properly introduced to the masses," she promised Tsuzuki, before she had completely tugged him away and into the crowds of students milling into the school.

"Hey, Akira said the coach really wants you on the archery team," Yuanyi said.  "They only practice three times a week, so you'll still have plenty of time to spend with the cute sensei."

Hisoka's blush intensified.  "Yuanyi, we're not . . . /like/ that."

"Uh huh, sure, sure.  So you /say/."

Hisoka sighed.  She was not going to believe him, no matter what he told her.  But he would admit, he was somewhat grateful that she seemed to accept it so openly.  That was, that he and Tsuzuki could possibly be more involved than they actually were . . .

He shook his head.  They were /not/ involved in anyway whatsoever, as Yuanyi liked to believe, and he doubted that they would ever be.  He and Tsuzuki had suffered through some hard times together, but that did not /mean/ anything.

But . . . hadn't he said '_I need you_' to Tsuzuki?  Had that not been the truth?

It /was/ the truth, and Hisoka wondered if that was what frightened him.

"Yuanyi, Hisoka!  Over here!"

Yuanyi whipped around and caught sight of the group that was calling for them.  The only people Hisoka recognized were Akira and Kensou before Yuanyi had began to drag him over, not giving him the chance to look around anymore.  He nearly fell over as she came to an abrupt stop.

"Good morning!" Yuanyi said cheerfully.  "Oh, hey.  Hijiri, ne?  How's the ankle?"

Hisoka looked.  Hijiri was in fact amongst the small group, standing nestled between Akira and a girl he recognized as one from the lunch table yesterday, by the name of Ayame.  He did not seem as familiar with Yuanyi as he was with the other two, but he returned her bright smile with one of his own.

"It's fine," he said.  "Just a sprain."  He held up his bandaged foot to demonstrate, balancing on one of his crutches.  "Ne, Hisoka, where's Tsuzuki?"

"Nurse office," Hisoka mumbled in response, not knowing why it bothered him that Hijiri was asking about Tsuzuki.

"Hey, you know the cute new nurse too?" a girl, Yui, interrupted.  "Tell us about him!"

"Yeah, tell us!" Ayame piped up.

Hijiri looked startled.  "Well, er, Tsuzuki is just this guy that helped me out once.  He . . ."

"Is a glutton for punishment and an even bigger glutton for food," Hisoka cut in.   

Now why, he wondered, had he felt it necessary to say that?  Maybe it was because he wanted to shut up Hijiri.  It was not that it was the way he honestly felt about Tsuzuki; that couldn't be any further from the truth.  It was just that . . . well, he didn't know.  It had just come out that way.

"Hey," Yui said suddenly, nudging Yuanyi in the side, "there's Kaiki."

  
Yuanyi glanced over her shoulder.  "Hey, Kai!" she called, waving an arm in the air to catch the attention of the passing boy.  "Come over here!"

Having been walking with his head down, the boy looked up briefly.  Hisoka wondered how old he was.  He had the body shape and the basic appearance of a teenager, but something about his eyes made Hisoka wonder if he actually was.  Those same eyes had something haunted about them.  They were a striking color of silver, but clouded over that made them less striking to look at on a second glance.  But it was not his eyes that were the most intriguing, but his hair, which was the shade of gold.  Not blonde gold, as Hisoka's hair was, but a true gold color, like that of the actual substance.

He gave a smile, a brief twitch of his lips, and made some gesture to sign that he needed to hurry inside.  He disappeared a moment later and Yuanyi let out a disappointed sound.

"That guy," she said, sighing.  "We've been trying to get him out of his shell all school year, but he just won't budge."

"He's new?" Hisoka asked.

"Aa," Kensou confirmed.  "Shinori Kaiki, but everyone just calls him Kai.  He transferred here at the beginning of the year from Hokkaido.  He's pretty quiet and keeps to himself.  Yuanyi made it her personal goal to get a conversation out of him."

"And I will," Yuanyi said determinedly, just as the bell was ringing.  "Er, right after language, that is.  Hisoka, I'll see you in algebra!  And don't forget – archery practice today!"

Hisoka had not been able to escape from his newfound group of friends to join Tsuzuki for lunch, nor was he able to escape after lunch, since the period following was algebra and he shared that with Yuanyi, but following that class it was a self-study period.  He slipped gratefully away from class before anyone could catch him and hurried downstairs to the nurse's office.  As much as he enjoyed his new group of friends, he needed a moment away to talk to Tsuzuki.

"Hey Tsuzuki," he began, stepping into the infirmary, but he stopped as his eyes came to rest on just who was seated with Tsuzuki.

"Oh, hi, Hisoka," Hijiri said cheerfully.  "We were wondering if you'd show up."

Hisoka slowly closed the door behind him.  "Shouldn't you be in class?"

"It's my lunch break right now, so I thought I'd come see Tsuzuki."

Hisoka glanced at his partner.  Tsuzuki gave a careless smile and a shrug of his shoulders.  He, at least, enjoyed the company that Hijiri offered him.  Tsuzuki always did have a soft spot for the boy, and even now, that did not settle right with Hisoka.  

He had almost accepted that it was because he was jealous, in some bizarre way.  The problem was taking care of what was causing his jealousy, and he had no idea how to get rid of Hijiri.  Except maybe to push him in front of a bus or something.

"Hijiri's been trying to help me crack the case," Tsuzuki explained, and at that comment, Hisoka could feel his blood boiling.

"Then I guess I'll just leave you two to it," he said irritably, reaching for the doorknob.

"Oh, don't go!" Tsuzuki said quickly.  "I need your help too, you know."

The younger shinigami would have much rather gone and fumed about his current state of affairs, but he had never been able to straight out say no to Tsuzuki.  With a sigh, he released the knob and settled down on one of the free beds.  Hijiri had already finished his lunch, he noted, but had yet to leave.  He was probably going to skip the next period to spend more time with Tsuzuki.

"So have you figured anything out today, Hisoka?" Tsuzuki asked.

"I think Hijiri is wrong," Hisoka replied, looking pointedly at the boy in question.  "About Iida Yuanyi being the next one to die, I mean.  I'm around her a lot and she doesn't seem at all tired to me.  She's always real cheerful and . . . bouncy."

Hijiri returned the look evenly, apparently not noticing how much his presence was causing Hisoka discomfort.  "You don't know her that well, you know.  From what I know of her she does a good job of pretending she's okay, but you don't see her when she's not around people.  That's when it really starts to pull her down."

"And what is this 'it' you're talking about?" Hisoka asked sourly.

"I don't know.  The curse, I guess."

Tsuzuki continued to look repeatedly between the two of them, eyes wide.  "Wow.  Scary.  You both have the evil eyes going."

Both pairs of evil eyes fixated on him, and Tsuzuki gave an eep and devoted his attention back to his slice of apple pie.

"Well, anyway, I'll keep an eye on Yuanyi, just in case," Hisoka said.  "You keep your eyes open too, Tsuzuki."

"Aa, I am, I am!" Tsuzuki promised.  "You didn't find anything else out, ne?  Nothing unusual?"

"Saw an unusual guy, but that's not much."

"Eh?"

"Gold hair, silver eyes . . . kind of creepy looking."

"Oh, you mean Shinori Kaiki," Hijiri interrupted.

Hisoka favored him with another sour look and nodded his head once as his response.  He had almost been able to forget for a moment there that Hijiri was in the room with them.  He would have preferred it if he were not; that was the honest truth.  Hijiri made it more uncomfortable for him to be on a working state of mind, he thought.  Or maybe that was one of the excuses he was coming up with for not liking Hijiri.

"Kai's a nice guy," Hijiri continued.  "Real quiet.  Keeps to himself a lot.  He plays cello in orchestra, and he's really good.  But whenever concerts and stuff come up and they want him to be in them, he always says no.  I think he's got social anxiety or something."

"He's new," Hisoka added.

"Maybe he's just shy," Tsuzuki suggested.  He smiled suddenly.  "Or maybe he's like Hisoka.  Real mean and abrasive."

Hisoka glared at him.  Tsuzuki gave another eep and vowed to keep his mouth shut for the remainder of the day.

"Well, I've got to go back to class," Hisoka said, standing up and gathering his books.  "I'm staying after for archery again, Tsuzuki.  You can go back to the hotel after school if you want to."

"Naw, I'll stick around and try to do some more research.  You go have fun."

Hisoka sighed.  "It's not fun.  It's work."

"Sure, sure," Tsuzuki said, not believing a word of it.  "Go on!"

"It's work," Hisoka insisted.

"Okay."

"It is."

"I believe you."

". . . . . .oh, nevermind."

  
Tsuzuki laughed.

Hisoka had unloaded a quiver of arrows, all directly to the center of the target, not even fifteen minutes into the archery practice.  By that time a group had gathered around him, awed by his capabilities.  Hisoka did not think quite as much of them as Akira was playing them up to be, saying that he was some kind of district champion.  Terazuma had much better aim than he did and could shoot from even further distances and still make it to the center of the target.

Still, the praise was as welcome just as much as it was embarrassing to him.  Hisoka took it all very modestly, but inside he was beaming.  Never had he been complimented growing up on something he did.  Even before his parents had tossed him away, claiming that he was some kind of monster, his father had not been pleased with his progress in his training as a bushi.  He had never seemed to be able to do good at anything, from the way his parents made it seem.  But these people were accepting him and praising him, and it was enough to bring a genuine smile to even his face.

"He~y, Hi-so-ka-kun!"

Yuanyi appeared at his side and slung an arm around his shoulders.

"You're doing great!" she said enthusiastically.  "With your help, our school might just make it to the district championships.  You're really good.  How long have you been doing this?"

"Since I could walk," Hisoka admitted.  "My parents thought it was proper for a kid to be brought up as a bushi."

"I'm sure it was just that they wanted the best for you," Yuanyi said optimistically.  "Now get back to work!"

Hisoka smiled and gave a brief salute with his bow before joining Akira and the others on the field again.  

They continued to practice for another twenty minutes or so, practicing aim and stance, which Hisoka of course excelled at far more than the other boys on the team.  The coach continually pointed to him as an example to the others, until Hisoka was blushing furiously and sure that everyone hated him for the praise the coach was giving him.  But Akira and the others only snickered and mimicked the coach when his back was turned to Hisoka, and he knew that they had no harsh feelings against him.

As he and Akira were putting their things together after practice, Akira stopped suddenly and looked around.  He was frowning.

"Hey, where's Yuanyi?  She always comes running down here after practice."

Hisoka straightened himself and as well let his eyes wander the area.  "I don't see her in the bleachers," he said.  "Maybe she went home early."

"No, that's not like her."

Hisoka could tell by the frown on Akira's face that it was more serious than he thought it was.  Akira began to walk across the field toward the bleachers, and Hisoka hastened to catch up with him.  There was a sudden empty feeling in the pit of his stomach, the way a person felt when they were nervous about something.  But for him, it was a feeling much worse than that.

"Yuanyi!" Akira called.  "Hey, Yuanyi!"

"Yuanyi!" Hisoka chimed in, cupping his hands over his mouth as he called.  "Hey, where are you?!"

He stopped as Akira did.  The other boy was knelt down on one knee, a terrible expression on his face.

"Oh man," he began slowly, "this isn't good . . ."

Hisoka hurried to his side.  "What's not good?  What're you . . . oh . . ."

Yuanyi was lying in the bleachers, apparently unconscious.  Hisoka waved a hand before her face and received no reaction, but he could feel very faint breath coming out of her mouth against the back of his hand as he passed it over her.  It was not hot enough, he didn't think, that she could have passed out from sunstroke.  Which meant that maybe, as much as he did not want to believe it, that Hijiri was right and Yuanyi /was/ the next victim . . .

"Come on, let's get her to the nurse," he said quickly.  "Careful picking her up.  Hey, watch it.  Okay, that's good . . . come on, let's hurry."

"Sunstroke," Tsuzuki said brightly.  "Nothing to worry about.  You can go on home, Akira-kun, she'll be just fine by tomorrow."

Hisoka sat in the desk chair of the nurse office, hand fisted against his cheek, watching as Tsuzuki spoke to Akira and lied to him about Yuanyi.  He knew it was not sunstroke, the same as Hisoka knew it was not, and he was sure that on some level that Akira knew it too.  But the boy accepted the explanation Tsuzuki gave him and drifted away, assured that his friend would be fine by morning.

"Hijiri's right," Hisoka said numbly as Tsuzuki closed the door behind Akira.  "She really is the next one that's going to die.  And there's nothing we can do about it."

"Don't be so pessimistic, Hisoka," Tsuzuki said.

"How can I /not/ be?!" Hisoka exclaimed.  "She's got less than a week to live if Hijiri is right about all of this, and we don't even know what's causing it!  If we don't know what's causing it, how can we help her?!  How can we prevent another death?!"

"Hisoka, you're shouting."

"I am not!"

Hisoka stopped suddenly.  He /was/ yelling, and he sounded absolutely hysterical.  It was almost amusing.  He shook his head, a small smile curving onto his lips.  A brief laugh escaped him.

"Sorry, Tsuzuki," he mumbled.

Tsuzuki did not respond.  What he did do was kneel down before Hisoka, one hand coming up to rest on the younger shinigami's knee.  Hisoka looked down at him, startled.

"I'm doing my best to figure this out, Hisoka," Tsuzuki said softly.  "I'll do everything in my power to keep her alive.  But you have to help me.  I can't do this alone."

Hisoka glanced at the hand on his knee, and after a moment of hesitation, he placed his own over Tsuzuki's.  "I know.  Sorry.  I'm trying too."

Tsuzuki smiled.  "I know."

With that, he stood up in a flash, and the smile on his face spread to become a full grin.  "Well, I'm going to go get some munchies from the cafeteria.  Can't work on an empty stomach, you know!"

He had whirled around and dashed out the door before Hisoka had the chance to give a response.  The younger shinigami sighed, shaking his head.  Tsuzuki was insane.  That was the only word he could use to describe his partner.  Tsuzuki /was/ insane, and that was all there was to it.  But he wouldn't change him in any way if he could.

He glanced over to the infirmary bed, where Yuanyi was.  In all outward appearances, she looked fast asleep and perfectly content, almost like a dead person . . .

Hisoka mentally berated himself for coming up with /that/ analogy.

But it was true, wasn't it?  He had never been to a funeral before in his life, but like every person, he knew what one constituted of.  There was a service where the priest or what have you would speak of the deceased and how they would be remembered.  Sometimes the person that was dead was viewable to all those that had come to the funeral.  That had always bothered Hisoka.  Why, he wondered, would anyone want to look at a dead body?  Especially considering what happened to the human body when it died . . .

He wondered if his parents had given him an open casket funeral, or if they had been too ashamed of him to allow people to see the face of their monster son.  He wondered if they had even bothered to give him a funeral at all.  It almost seemed more like them to shove him in a box and bury him in the ground, not even with a grave marker.

They would not have done that, he realized.  Regardless of what they had thought of him, he had been the one that would take the place as the head of their family someday.  The other members of the family would have insisted that he at least have some grave marker.  Whether or not he would be buried on family ground, he didn't know.  He didn't really want to think about it.  He was thinking too much about it as it was.

His gaze returned to Yuanyi . . . or so it attempted to.  He looked in the direction of where she was resting, or where she should have been resting, and found nothing in her place.  She was gone.

"Yuanyi?" he asked aloud, standing up.

He had not realized how dark the room was until now.  The sun had almost completely set, and he had been too involved in his thoughts to notice or turn on a light.  He started forward for the light switch, in hopes of making it easier to find Yuanyi, but he never made it that far.  There was a sudden flash of color and he found himself pinned down on the ground, Yuanyi above him, and a scalpel from a drawer in hand.

Hisoka quickly brought up a hand and clamped it down over the wrist wielding the scalpel, to keep it from coming any closer to him.  Yuanyi struggled against him, attempting to break free or at least make her mark with the weapon.  Hisoka kept having to move from side to side to avoid the scalpel coming dangerously close to his face.

"Yuanyi!  What's the matter with you?!  Stop!"

He saw her eyes then, as she made another move to stab him.  They were not her eyes.  They were hollow and lifeless, and reminded him of Tsubaki when Irene had been in control of her body.  This person attacking him as /not/ Yuanyi.

Hisoka brought up one leg beneath their two struggling forms, and his knee collided with her stomach.  Yuanyi, or whoever she was now, immediately pulled away from him, having the wind knocked out her.  She curled up in a feeble form on the ground, struggling to breathe.

"This would have been much easier," she choked out between gasps, "if you shinigami hadn't been involved."

Hisoka took a step away from her.  "Who are you?" he demanded.  "Why do you know about shinigami?"

She stood and smoothed her hair from her face, revealing the same hollow eyes and a wicked smile.  "Satsujinsha, demon of Makai, at your service.  This girl is my host body."

"You're the one that killed those people!"

"Well, naturally.  Once I had used them to their fullest extent, they were expendable.  This girl will not last much longer though, I'm afraid.  I should have chosen someone else.  But no matter.  You are a shinigami.  If I had your body, then I wouldn't need any other.  This is all too perfect."

"Wha . . ."

Hisoka was not sure what was happening.  The hollow look of her eyes disappeared and the wicked smile faded from her lips.  A pained expression overcame Yuanyi, and for a moment he thought that he could see her eyes staring out at him.  But that was for only the briefest second before she dropped down to the ground.  Her back seemed to split in two, reminding him too much of what had happened to Tsuzuki when Saagantanasu had left his body.  He remembered Tsuzuki's screams from that time, but this time it was Yuanyi that was screaming, and like then there was nothing he could do to help.

"Stop it!  You're killing her!"

He heard the words coming out of his mouth, but he did not feel his mouth moving or his vocal chords working.  He could hear himself yelling something else, but he was too horrified by the sight before him to actually realize what he was saying.

The demon, Satsujinsha as it had introduced itself, was shedding Yuanyi's body like a snake would do a used skin.  A head appeared from her back, a terrible thing that looked very much like the mythical dragon he remembered from books he had read as a child.  Then two bat-like wings followed, and then four clawed feet, and lastly, a long, spaded tail.  The demon took up the entire room and yet did not at the same time; it seemed to shrink and grow larger all at once.

It shook itself, like a dog just waking up from a nap, and spoke in a clear, cruel voice.  "You are next, shinigami."

Hisoka did not seem to hear the threat.  He rushed past the demon to where Yuanyi lay on the ground and gathered the girl into his arms.

"Yuanyi?  Yuanyi!"  He shook her, trying to bring her back to consciousness.  "Wake up!"

After a moment, her eyes fluttered open, the same bright brown eyes he remembered.  A smile appeared on her face.

"Hisoka-kun, you look really sad," she said.  "You're not going to cry, are you?"

"Hang on, you'll be okay.  Just hang on."

"Ne . . . it's okay," Yuanyi said softly.  "You know . . . I'm really just tired.  I'm going to go to sleep, okay?  So don't look so sad.  I'll see you in a bit."

"Don't go to sleep!  Don't close your eyes!"

He did not know whether or not she had heard him.  As he said the words, her eyes drifted closed, and as he shook her in the vain hope of waking her back up, she feel limp and lifeless in his arms.  

Hisoka saw in his mind the face of Tsubaki, how she had smiled just before he had pulled the trigger, and how accepting of death she had been, just like Yuanyi.  She had not fought against it.  Simply closed her eyes and allowed death to take her.  She would go on to Meifu and live in Joukai, he knew that and was glad of it, but the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach would not go away.  She was /dead/ and he had not been able to do anything to stop it.

"Now, shinigami . . . if you are quite done . . ."

He looked up.  Satsujinsha was advancing forward on him.  The clawed feet made a horrible sound against the tile floor as he came forward.  The bat-like wings scratched against the ceiling.  Hisoka watched him come forward for a moment, then looked away, into the lifeless face of Yuanyi.  Was he going to end up like this?  No, of course not, he was immortal.  If the demon took his body, then it too would be immortal . . . but he did not have the energy to stop it.

"Hisoka!"

He did not look up.  He did recognize that it was Tsuzuki calling his name, but he did nothing.

Tsuzuki cursed below his breath.  He did not have the time to make an assessment of the damage right now.  He made a blind move on his instincts alone, interjecting himself between his young partner and the demon.  In his hand he held a ofuda, posed between his index and middle finger.  His lips began to form the beginning syllables of a spell.  As he said the last word, he let go of the ofuda, and it exploded to become a ring of fire.

The demon gave a hideous cry of pain.  Tsuzuki prepared to do another spell, but was not given the chance.  The demon was not an idiot, he was sorry to say, and took that very moment to make its retreat.  Tsuzuki was grateful for that, but disappointed that he could not take care of the problem right at that moment.  This only meant that things would become more complicated.

"Hisoka," he remembered suddenly.  

He turned around.  Hisoka was still seated on the floor, Yuanyi in his arms.  Tsuzuki knelt slowly beside him.

"Hisoka?"

"I couldn't do anything," Hisoka said numbly.  "I just let her die.  There was nothing I could do."

Tsuzuki winced.  He wanted to comfort Hisoka, but how could he, when he too was constantly plagued by these same feelings and coped with them no better than Hisoka was?  He could not tell him that he would eventually feel better, because that was a lie.  Cases from even thirty years ago Tsuzuki still remembered vividly, as though they had only been the day before.  That was the curse of living life as a shinigami.

"Come on, Hisoka," he began gently.  "We have to notify someone about this, so her parents can take care of the body and everything . . ."

"I let her die!  I let her die!"

Hisoka continued to cry out things hysterically.  Tsuzuki could not deal with it for much longer, and in a blindingly quick movement, he had placed both hands on either side of Hisoka's face firmly, startling the younger shinigami into shutting his mouth.  Tears still continued to fall down his cheeks.

"Stop it, Hisoka!  If there was nothing you could do, there was nothing you could do!  Accept that!"

"Tsu . . . Tsuzuki . . ."

"Accept that," Tsuzuki repeated, his voice softer and gentle.  He brought up a hand and brushed away the tears on Hisoka's face with his knuckles.  "Accept that, Hisoka."

Hisoka closed his eyes.  Several moments of silence passed between them before he made any movement.  Only then it was a brief nod of his head, acknowledging Tsuzuki's words.  Tsuzuki sighed.

"Come on.  Let's get this sorted out . . ."


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes:** I have Watari call Hisoka 'bouya' in this chapter.  Which is pretty much boy, of course.  He always sounded like he was saying 'bon' when he referred to Hisoka, but since I'm not really sure on what that means, I've just got it as bouya here.

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Three**

A third death in such a short span of time at the same school caused an immediate media scandal.  Tsuzuki was forced to be questioned repeatedly by the police and school officials about the nature of Yuanyi's death, but as she had died without a blemish on her body or even the slightest hint that she was in ill health, nothing could be held against him, much less anyone else.  Hisoka would have been questioned as well, but Tsuzuki was able to convince the police to leave him alone for the time being, at least until he was ready to talk.  The school was closed early, and according to the principal, would remain that way for at least another week.

It was well into the evening now.  Once the questioning was done, Tsuzuki had taken Hisoka out for dinner in the hopes of perking him up some, but Hisoka had only poked at his food and eaten maybe two or three bites at the most.  When it was obvious that he would not be feeling better anytime soon, Tsuzuki had taken him back to the hotel.  He had already made his report to EnmaCho, and he suspected that they would soon send one of the Gushoshin their way to research this demon they were dealing with.

He glanced over at his young partner.  Hisoka was stretched out on one of the beds, hands tucked behind his head, staring up at the ceiling.  He had said nothing throughout the duration of the day, and Tsuzuki had stopped attempting to make small talk over two hours ago.  Still, he could not stand to see Hisoka like this.  

He knew, that had it been anyone else, that Hisoka would not be taking this as badly as he was.  If it had not been Yuanyi that had died, he would be fine.  But it /was/ Yuanyi, and that was what was hurting him.  His friend, one of the few friends he had ever had, was dead.  Tsuzuki did not know how to comfort him.

He did realize, however, that it was probably for the best to allow Hisoka to sort through this on his own, whether he liked it or not.  When a person was in pain, there was very little that could be done to alleviate it, Tsuzuki was sorry to admit.  

It was not that a person did not want help.  People /did/ want comfort when they were upset, no matter what they attempted to say, and it /could/ make them feel marginally better to know that someone cared.  But the fact remained that when it came to pain and depression, a person had to suffer through it on their own, and it was up to them whether or not they would heal.

There came a knock at the hotel room door.  Tsuzuki frowned and hopped up; he didn't remember calling for room service.

"I'll get it," he said, but he doubted that Hisoka would make a leap to answer it in any case.  He only gave a slight shrug of his shoulders to acknowledge that he had heard Tsuzuki, then continued to stare vacantly up at the ceiling.

Tsuzuki began to open the door, and did not even have the chance to pull it open fully before a head had poked in.

"Yo!"

"W-Watari?!"

Watari stepped fully into the room, gave a bright smile, and a wave of his hand.  "Tatsumi sent me to help you two find out just what demon you're dealing with," he explained.  "So here I am.  Hiya, bouya."

Hisoka lifted his hand and waved vaguely, not seeming overly surprised that it was Watari that they had sent as opposed to one of the Gushoshin.  Watari gave Tsuzuki a rather confused look, but Tsuzuki only shook his head and shrugged his shoulders.  He couldn't explain Hisoka's behavior to him either, and he didn't particularly want to try while Hisoka was within hearing range and might be offended by their words.

"Well," Watari began, "might as well get to work, shall we?"

Tsuzuki shook his head.  "It's late and Hisoka's had a long day.  Tomorrow would be better."

"Tonight is fine," Hisoka interrupted irritably.

Tsuzuki flinched slightly as the harshness of his voice, but gave a slight nod and gestured for Watari to set up his work station.  The other shinigami spared another nervous glance at Hisoka, but with a shrug went over to the table to set up his computer.  Tsuzuki sighed and sat down across from him.

"This would be easier if I could narrow down the search a bit," Watari said.  He had hooked up his computer and was flipping through the various archives he had on the subject of Makai and demons.  "You saw it, right, Tsuzuki?"

"Yeah.  It looked like a dragon.  Bat-wings, dragon face, four legs, tail."

"It said its name was Satsujinsha," Hisoka put in quietly.

"Well, /that/ certainly helps," Watari said with a grin.

He typed rapidly at his computer for another moment or two before coming up with exactly what he was looking for.  He smiled proudly and pointed to the screen.

"Is this your demon?"

Tsuzuki leaned over the table and looked at the image there.  It was in fact the demon he had seen earlier today, and it was a particularly gruesome thing, he could tell.  Far worse than it had been when he had first seen it, but then he supposed that he had been too distracted by his worry for Hisoka to actually pay attention to what he was up against.

"That's it," he confirmed.  "Ne, Hisoka?"

Hisoka shrugged.

"Let's see here . . ."  Watari was typing a mile a minute at his computer again.  "Satsujinsha isn't even considered to be one of the most powerful demons of Makai.  Apparently he did something to upset the Lord of Makai, and so he was cursed to never his own form completely.  He has to body hop from person to person in order to survive.  He eats away at the mitochondria in a person's body and that's what gives him the energy to live."

"Eats the whatta?" Tsuzuki asked.

"Mitochondria.  A spherical or elongated organelle in the cytoplasm of nearly all eukaryotic cells, containing genetic material and many enzymes important for cell metabolism, including those responsible for the conversion of food to usable energy," Watari said, reciting directly from the definition he had brought up on his computer screen.  Tsuzuki only continued to stare at him blankly.

"What that /means/ is that mitochondria is what is responsible for giving people energy," Watari confirmed.  "Without it, food can't be broken down and the nutrients taken to be dispersed to the body, so basically if you don't have any mitochondria, you don't really have any energy.  That explains why those kids died without any blemish or anything really wrong with their organs.  How many autopsies bother to take a mitochondria count?"

"So it eats energy," Hisoka said.  "And without it, it dies."

"Yup," Watari replied, leaning back in his chair.  "It feeds on people and once its taken all of what they can give them, it hops to another body and drains them of their energy.  Your main problem would be that Satsujinsha apparently can't stay out of a body for very long in his true form, and only hops out when a person dies.  You'll have to catch him right as he's hopping out of a body to find another and kill him then.  That's when it will be weakened.  I'm sure it'll be no trouble for Tsuzuki."

Tsuzuki paled.  "Oh, no trouble.  No trouble at all."

"You're saying we have to let another person die," Hisoka said.

Tsuzuki glanced over at him.  He was sitting up, looking at both Tsuzuki and Watari, with an unreadable expression on his face.

"Well . . ." Watari began.

"That's exactly what you're saying," Hisoka interrupted.  "We can't catch the demon unless it's body-hopping out of someone else, like you said, and when it does that, the person it was in dies.  So we have to let another person die."

"Sometimes lives have to be sacrificed to save others," Watari replied vaguely.  "There's nothing we can do about that."

"That's not fair!"

"Life never really is, is it?"

"It's late," Tsuzuki put in, attempting to be a peacemaker.  "We should all get some sleep . . ."

Watari smiled and agreed to that suggestion.  Tsuzuki glanced at Hisoka, finding his younger partner looking at him with a furious expression on his face.  But there was nothing he could say that would make Hisoka feel better, and he could not apologize for what they had to do.

"It's just the duty of a shinigami, Hisoka," he murmured softly.

Hisoka did not answer him.  The furious look became one of pain, as though he had honestly expected for Tsuzuki to take his side on this matter, but just as quickly as it had come it was replaced with a hardened expression.  Hisoka turned his back on him and said nothing.

Tsuzuki sighed aloud.  First week back on the job, and they gave him /this/ case . . . life was not fair at all.

When he opened his eyes, Tsuzuki thought for a moment that it was already morning.  But on a look around the room, he saw the curtains drawn and a very thin thread of moonlight streaming into the room, which meant that it could not be very early at all.  He sat up with a sigh, running his hands through his hair.  He wasn't sure what had woken him up.  It could have been a nightmare, but if it was, he did not remember what it was about or why it had woken him.

Watari was seated in one of the chairs at the table, a pillow propped up behind him, and a blanket from one of the beds wrapped around him.  His glasses were hanging off the tip of his nose.  He had said that while he wanted to have a room of his own, Tatsumi was too cheap to offer any money for him to spend, and had suggested that he just sleep on the floor of Tsuzuki and Hisoka's hotel room.  Tatsumi was not going to waste money when they could already make do with what they had.

Tsuzuki glanced to his side, to the opposite full size bed where Hisoka slept.  But his eyes did not find Hisoka nestled beneath the covers.  They were bunched up at the end of the bed, and there was no trace of Hisoka.  The bathroom light was not on, which meant that he was not there, and on a look around the room, Tsuzuki saw that his shoes were missing.

He immediately threw his own covers off and climbed out of bed.  Somehow he located his clothes in the darkness and even more remarkable, he was able to dress quickly and efficiently without banging into something or waking up Watari.  Careful not to make a sound, he slipped outside of the room, into the well-lit hotel room.  He hurried down the stairs and outside of the building; he had a feeling that wherever Hisoka had gone, it had not been for a late night run to the vending machines.

There were not many places he could go, Tsuzuki reminded himself as he started down the street.  Everywhere that was open this time of night were all after hours clubs, and Hisoka could not get into one of those no matter how much he tried.  A few convenience stores might still be open, but Tsuzuki somehow doubted that he would have gone there.

There was a small park across the street of the hotel.  Tsuzuki headed in that direction.  While it was not likely for Hisoka to go to a night club or a convenience store this late at night, it /was/ likely for him to take a midnight stroll through the park.  And if he was not there, Tsuzuki had no idea where else he /could/ look.

He shoved his hands in his pockets as he walked along, surprised that it was so cold this time of night.  He supposed it had to be very late, somewhere around three in the morning, or he might have seen a few pairs of people walking through the park and enjoying the tranquility of night.  But since he did not, he imagined they were all home and in bed, like rational human beings.  Like he could have been, he thought with a wide yawn.

It was an hour later that he gave up in his search for Hisoka.  He plopped down on one of the many park benches, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees and hands clasped together.  Even though Hisoka was stupid enough to go out alone in the city this late at night, he doubted that he was stupid enough to stay out all evening.  He'd probably already gone back to the hotel by now, Tsuzuki imagined, and like the poor shmuck he was, he was /still/ looking for him.  Life really wasn't that fair.

"Tsuzuki?"

A voice startled him from his dozing.  Tsuzuki looked up and found Hisoka standing a distance from him, hands in his pockets and eyebrows raised.  The older shinigami let out a sigh or relief and ran a hand through his hair.

"I was worried about you."

Hisoka gave a shrug of his shoulders and looked away.  "I'm fine.  I just needed some fresh air."

"Oh.  Well . . ."

"You didn't have to come after me."

Tsuzuki glanced up at him.  Hisoka sighed slightly and came forward, settling down beside Tsuzuki on the bench.

"I really am okay," he said quietly.  "Watari is right.  If we want to save anymore lives, we have to let this last one go."

"Are you sure about that?"

"I thought you agreed with him."

Tsuzuki shrugged his shoulders in an almost nonchalant manner.  He had not wanted to be involved in the argument, and for that reason he had said nothing.  In a way, he agreed with both of them.  It was not fair that someone else had to die for the sake of saving dozens more lives, but on the one hand, one life was nothing compared to ten or fifty more that could die because of this demon.

"I do, in a way," he admitted.  "I think we have to let this person go, whoever it is, so no one else dies.  But I wonder what I would do if I were that person.  I could sacrifice my life to save so many others, but what about me?  I'd be dead.  That's why it's hard."

Hisoka nodded slightly, to acknowledge that he understood.  "I just wish there was an easier way.  And that we'd figure it out before she had to die."

"You really liked her, didn't you?"

"I . . ."  Hisoka faltered a moment and felt a blush rising up on his cheeks.  "I guess so, yeah.  She was just . . . I don't know.  Really nice.  She didn't know me at all but she talked to me anyway, and was kind to me, and she tried to get me involved . . . even when she didn't have to.  I thought we could be friends."

He felt his blush intensify as he said those words.  He was acting like a lovesick teenager; he knew that was exactly how he must sound to Tsuzuki.

It was also uncomfortable to talk this openly with Tsuzuki.  He was not about to admit that what he was most upset about concerning Yuanyi's death was the fact that she /had/ been his friend, and one of the very few in his life.  It made him seem as though he were searching for pity when he admitted that he had never been close to anyone growing up, and even now.  The last thing he wanted was pity, especially from Tsuzuki.

"I understand what you mean," was all that Tsuzuki said, however, and Hisoka nearly breathed a sigh of relief that he was accepting his odd behavior so well.

"Well," Tsuzuki said, giving a wide yawn and stretching out his arms behind his back, "are you ready to get back to the hotel?"

"We can go if you're tired."

"You want to stay?"  
  
Hisoka shrugged his shoulders, feeling embarrassed all over again.  There was something about sitting here with Tsuzuki that was calming to him.  He didn't want that feeling to go away.

"Okay," Tsuzuki said suddenly, smiling.  "We'll stay.  Just poke me a bit if I start to fall asleep."

A faint smile appeared on Hisoka's face.  "Yeah, okay."

"Oh, and here."

Hisoka glanced at him, wondering what he meant, and did not even catch a glimpse of Tsuzuki's face before the older shinigami had flipped off his jacket and settled it around Hisoka's shoulders.  The collar caught on the top of his head, providing a hood for him.  He stared out at Tsuzuki, blinking wide, confused green eyes.

"You'll catch a cold, you know," Tsuzuki said in his very best Tatsumi voice.

"What about you?" Hisoka demanded.  Beneath his jacket, Tsuzuki was dressed only in a white dress shirt and a pair of dark slacks.

"I don't get colds.  /I'm/ the adult."

"So /act/ like one."

"I act like an adult!"  
  


"You act like an overgrown three-year-old."

"Well at least I'm not an anti-social bratty teenager."

"Hey!"

  
Tsuzuki only smiled and laughed.

Two deaths were accepted at the school by the parents and faculty members as a terrible coincidence and tragedy, but nothing that called for suspicious.  Two deaths were spread around as rumors of foul play amongst students, who made up tales that it was some terrible curse that would claim someone as its victim when they walked beneath the moon at midnight.  But it was three deaths that caused anyone to take matters seriously.

The entire feeling of the school and its occupants had changed to Hisoka, now that it had opened again a week after Yuanyi's death.  All after school activities were canceled, for as long as it took for the police to investigate the deaths and discover whether or not it was the work of a murderer that these children were dying.  A great deal of students were taken out of school for the time being by their parents.  The staff was more on edge, and classes were rarely taught.  Most teachers gave their students self-study periods, which gave Hisoka quite a bit of time to spend with Tsuzuki.

Hijiri spent the majority of his time in the infirmary with Tsuzuki and Hisoka as well.  His mother could not afford to take him out of school for any amount of time, and as it was, he had no fear that he was the one that would be the next victim.

Hisoka did not mind that Hijiri spent time with them, as long as Tsuzuki did not mind.  And of course, the older shinigami did not mind at all.  Hisoka, like everyday, continued to watch them as Hijiri soaked up all of the attention Tsuzuki showered on him, while Tsuzuki, quite unaware of what he was doing, kept unknowingly causing Hijiri to like him more and more.  Hisoka wondered what would happen, if Hijiri were to say something or possible make a move on Tsuzuki.

Hisoka thought if anything happened, it would be his fist colliding into Hijiri's jaw.

He shook his head and looked away from the pair in favor of the book in his lap.  He knew nothing would happen.  Even if Hijiri were to do something, Tsuzuki was far too dense to realize that Hijiri liked him on a level far more than a friend.  And if Hijiri did something extremely outrageous, like kissing Tsuzuki, Hisoka knew that his older partner was still too dense to react, much less return the gesture.

Whether or not he was jealous, he was at least assured that there would be no time in the near future that Hijiri would take off with Tsuzuki.  It just wasn't going to happen.

"So, Hijiri," Tsuzuki began around a mouthful of the apple pie he was stashing in the infirmary refrigerator, "any signs yet of who's the next one?"

"I haven't noticed anything," Hijiri replied.  He too was sharing with Tsuzuki the apple pie.  Hisoka had been offered a piece, but he didn't like sweets very much and had declined.

"It might be another week yet before we've got a good idea," Tsuzuki said regrettably.  "I was hoping we could get this over and done with soon, too."

Hijiri looked up at him, his eyes wide.  "You're going to leave soon?"

"Well, once the case is solved, yeah."  Tsuzuki blinked.  "It's not like we can stay."

"I know that," Hijiri said, his eyes falling back to his plate.  Suddenly the pie did not appeal to him nearly as much as it had before.  He poked at it for a few times before pushing it away from him.

"Yuanyi died within two weeks of being possessed by the demon," Hisoka spoke up from his position on the bed.  "Maybe this one will be even shorter.  It's already been a week, after all."

Tsuzuki smiled slightly in his direction.  "Yeah, maybe so."  He stood up, taking his coat along with him.  "Well, I'm going to go find Watari and see if he's found out a way we can find out where the demon is.  I'll be back in an hour!"

He gave a wave and abandoned the two boys to their own devices.  Hisoka did not say anything to Hijiri; only to continued to flip slowly through the book in his lap.  It took him several moments to realize that Hijiri's eyes were on him.

"What?" he asked with a sigh, looking up.

"Don't sound too enthusiastic," Hijiri said dryly.

"You want I should hop up and down for joy?" Hisoka returned with the same amount of blandness.

Hijiri glared at him, but broke away from the stare down only after a moment or two.  Hisoka shook his head slightly to himself, devoting his attention once again to the book in his lap.  He had the peace of reading all of three lines before he realized again that Hijiri was looking at him.

"You think I'm going to steal him, don't you?" Hijiri demanded.

Hisoka blinked.  A wave of jealousy washed over him, all of it coming from Hijiri.

So that was it.  Just as much as he was jealous of Hijiri and Tsuzuki, Hijiri was in return jealous of he and Tsuzuki.  Both of them had created some kind of rivalry between them in their minds, all for the sake of Tsuzuki.  It was almost laughable, really.

"No, I don't think you're going to steal him," Hisoka replied, smiling slightly.

"Then why are you always glaring at me when I'm with him?" Hijiri demanded.

Hisoka gave a sigh, one of those patient sighs a parent gave their child when the child was acting completely irrational.  "Even if you and Tsuzuki /did/ have something between you, it would never work.  He's a shinigami.  You're a human."

"So?"

"So," Hisoka said with the same patience, "a relationship between a shinigami and a mortal is forbidden by JuOhCho."

Hijiri looked as though he wanted to retaliate with something equally nasty in return, but he was not given the chance.  There came a very light knocking at the door, and a moment later a person stepped into the room.  Hisoka was surprised to see that it was Shinori Kaiki, the boy that Yuanyi and Kensou had pointed out to him.

"Excuse me . . . is the doctor in?"

"He went out," Hijiri answered.  "What's wrong?"

Kai stepped completely into the room.  Hisoka noticed that he held a hand to his forehead, as though he were nauseous, and he was walking very slowly.  Dots of perspiration covered his brow.

"I'm just feeling really weak right now," he explained quietly, "so I thought I could come lie down for awhile . . ."

"The doctor only stepped out for a little while," Hisoka said, slipping off the bed.  "You can go ahead and rest for awhile."

Kai smiled faintly, gratefully.  Hisoka made sure that he made it to the bed without overexerting himself, and once he was resting comfortably, he drew the curtain around the bed to give him some privacy.  Hijiri was staring at Hisoka, mouth open, finger pointing toward Kaiki.

"He . . . he's the one that . . ."

"Be quiet," Hisoka hissed.  "Yeah, you're probably right, but don't go yelling it before you freak him out or something."

"Sorry," Hijiri mumbled.

Hisoka settled down in a chair opposite of Hijiri, eyes locked on the closed curtain.

"Maybe you should go," he said slowly.

He was recalling to mind what had happened when it was Yuanyi that was possessed, and what Satsujinsha had said to him.  The demon had wanted /his/ body, the body of a shinigami, an immortal body that would last him until the end of time.  If he was able to leap out of a body when he pleased, then he could do the same at any moment.  Hisoka did not want Hijiri to be there if that happened.

"Why?" Hijiri demanded.  "What do you know?"

"A lot more than you," Hisoka retorted.

There was the sound of faint movement behind the curtain.  Hisoka stood up cautiously.

"Go," he commanded softly.  "Find Tsuzuki."

Hijiri seemed to realize that he was serious.  He gave a slight nod of his head and hurried out of the infirmary, leaving Hisoka alone to deal with the demon.

He waited, tensely, all of the muscles in his body tight and his hands clasped as fists at his sides.

The curtain moved once again.  He could see a shadow behind it, the shape of an enormous creature stepping out of a freshly discarded skin.  His muscles, if it were at all possible, seemed to tighten even more than they already were.

The shadow moved slowly forward.  Hisoka took a step back just as the curtain began to sway.  The draconian head of the demon appeared, and with it, a cruel smiled curved onto its terrible features.  Kaiki lie on the bed, dead.

"I was hoping I would find you.  This time I /will/ have what I want."

"You've got to try and catch me first," Hisoka replied, and with that, he turned and took off running.  The demon let out an outraged scream and followed.

He had no idea where he was going or what he was doing, Hisoka realized as he wheeled around another corner.  He could keep running forever and the demon would keep following him, but there had to be a point that both of them had to stop.  He only hopped that it was the demon that had to stop long before he did.

Hisoka knew that whatever he did, he could not endanger the school or any of the people inside.  With that thought in mind, he took a turn around another corner, nearly slipping on the tile floor as he did so, and sprinted forward toward the back exit of the school.  Behind him he could hear the four claws of the demon on the ground as it came after him, but he refused to spare a look over his shoulder to see how close it was.  He only continued running, knowing that it was his life on the line this time.

He burst out of the school and into the settling dawn outside.  He continued to run for several yards before he dared to stop and turn around.  The moment he did, the demon appeared at the double doors, and he realized that it was much too large to fit.  Hisoka almost breathed a sigh of relief, but it was short lived.  The demon burst through, breaking down the doors and surrounding wall with it as it came through.

"I'm going to die," Hisoka moaned to no one in particular, as he struggled to breathe.

The demon roared in what sounded to be a triumphant voice.  Hisoka turned and began running again.  It came after him, he knew it did, but he did not hear the sound of its clawed feet against the ground.  What he heard was the sound of wings beating.  Wings.  It was flying after him.  It was going to catch him.

A claw lashed out at him.  Hisoka cried in pain as he felt three talons tearing into his back.  He attempted to keep running, but the demon had succeeded in what it had been intending to do.  The pain was so much that he collapsed to his knees, struggling to breathe and cope with the back-searing pain racing through him.

He could hear the feather-light sound of four claws settling on the ground.  Satsujinsha advanced forward on him.  Hisoka could almost see the wicked smile on the demon's face as it neared closer and closer to him.

The moment that he thought it was over and he had begun to close his eyes to accept his fate, he saw a blur of white, and then suddenly something was standing over him.  Soft hair, the velvet soft hair a cat possessed, brushed over his now bare back.  He opened his eyes and saw an enormous paw directly beside his face.  Turning slightly, careful not to lie completely on his back, he saw the complete form of Byakko, standing over him protectively.  And at the shikigami's side was Tsuzuki.

"Tsu . . . Tsuzuki . . ."

Hisoka did not see what had happened.  Even before Tsuzuki and Byakko had made a move, unconsciousness had swept over and taken him.

"Oh, hey, he's coming out of it!"

It seemed more difficult than any other time in his life for Hisoka to fully open his eyes.  He was almost immediately blinded by bright, artificial lights beaming down on him.  It took him several moments to realize that he was in bed, shirtless, and that his torso was almost completely wrapped up in gauze.  Tsuzuki was seated at his side, looking at him anxiously.  Hijiri was standing at the end of the bed.  Watari was at his other side.

"Wha . . . what happened?"

"You passed out, bouya," Watari said, smiling at him.  "But no worries, you're fine.  Must have been because of all that running you were doing.  The cut really wasn't that bad.  And I searched you, just in case that thing could possess just by touching, but you're fine.  Apparently Satsujinsha doesn't have that ability."

Hisoka glanced around, blinking several times to clear his vision.  "Have I been out of it long?" he asked slowly.

"I'd say maybe two hours," Watari estimated.

"Tsuzuki?"  Hisoka looked to his side.  Tsuzuki smiled at him.

"Everything's fine.  Byakko and I were able to take care of the demon.  It's dead.  No one else will die."

Hisoka nodded slightly and settled back more comfortably against the pillows.  He was glad that everything had worked out, despite the fact he had not actually done anything to help the case in the long run, he didn't think.  Tsuzuki was the one that had destroyed the demon and prevented it from possessing and killing anyone else.

"We should let him get some rest," Tsuzuki suggested.

Watari and Hijiri nodded, gave their wishes for a quick recovery to Hisoka, and slipped out of the room.  Tsuzuki stood up to join them.

"You get some sleep," he said.  "I'll take care of all the loose ends."

Hisoka smiled, a very faint smile.  "Thanks, Tsuzuki."

The older shinigami returned the smile and reached out to brush a few stray strands from Hisoka's face.  "Hey, that's what partners are for, right?  Sleep well."

Hisoka nodded and nestled more deeply beneath the covers, feeling for once in his life undeniably secure and happy.


	5. Chapter Five

**Notes:** Ah, the dreaded created character!  I hope you all like Kai.  He's going to be around for awhile. (oh, and look up the meaning of 'kaiki' sometime . . . it has some real interesting ones)

I kept this chapter short and sweet.  The point was to introduce Kai, then move on with everything else I have planned.  So I hope this serves as a good introduction.

Also, the TV series has Tsuzuki working in Nagasaki in the first episode arc, and Konoe mentions that Nagasaki is his region.  In the manga, it always says his area is Kyushu, and I'm not sure which exactly to have Tsuzuki and Hisoka working in . . . so I may mention Kyushu, and then that they are working in Nagasaki, or whatever . . . like I've said, all the Chos and districts and everything confuse the hell out of me, so . . . ^_^;;;  When Tsuzuki is explaining everything to Kai, I'm sure I'm getting everything wrong, but that's as far as my understanding goes, so please just bear with me.

Oh, and I use the word _shiryou_ when referring to a spirit, which means 'spirit of dead person' or 'ghost' or 'departed soul'.

And I apologize for Tsuzuki and Terazuma being such dorks at the end, but I couldn't resist . . . I love it when they fight. ^-^

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Four**

"Waaaaaaaai!  Wakaba-chan knows all the best things that I like!"

Hisoka glanced up from the book in his lap.  Tsuzuki was seated at his desk, an array of desserts lined up before him in alphabetical order.  Wakaba had kept her promise when she had said that she would make him more good things to eat, but he had not expected her to give him as much as she did.  Probably she had tried to coax Terazuma into sharing it with her, but being the way he was, Terazuma had declined.  Not likely very kindly at that, and Tsuzuki was the fortunate one that won out in the end.

"Apple pie, cheesecake, chocolate chip cookies, pumpkin pie, and strawberry sherbet," Tsuzuki declared happily, reciting their names in order.  He shoved a piece of apple pie into his mouth and leaned back in his chair to wave slightly to Hisoka, in order to catch his attention.  "Ne, Hisoka," he said, his mouth full, "y'want sum?"

"Uh, no thanks," Hisoka declined politely.

Tsuzuki shrugged.  "Your loss!" he said, shoveling in another piece of apple pie.  Hisoka sighed and shook his head.

He had not proceeded another three pages in his book before he was interrupted again, this time by Wakaba coming into the office he shared with Tsuzuki.  Since it was Wakaba and not anyone else, he did not get as irritated as he normally might have.  Unlike some people at EnmaCho, he genuinely liked Wakaba.  As long as he was not the object of her desires, that was.  He honestly felt bad for Terazuma at times.

"Ne, Tsuzuki-san, you like?" she asked.

"I love!" Tsuzuki replied cheerfully.

Wakaba smiled brightly.  Hisoka wondered what it was about her that made her so happy just to please someone else.  Maybe she just liked to see people smile, and if she could be the reason, she was all the happier.  She succeeded in this with almost everyone but Terazuma.  Hisoka supposed that was why she liked him so much.  He was a challenge.

"Tatsumi-san said to come and get you two," Wakaba said.  "They're having a staff meeting."

Tsuzuki looked down mournfully at his food.  "Why do they always have meetings just when I get good things to ear?  Waaaaai, it's so unfair!"

Hisoka stood up, took Tsuzuki by the back of his collar, and proceeded to drag his older partner out of the room and down the hall.  A few eyebrows went up, but no one looked that surprised at all.  It was a common occurrence around the Shokan Division of EnmaCho.

Konoe, Tatsumi, and Terazuma were all seated in the meeting room when Hisoka came in with Tsuzuki following grudgingly along behind him.  Wakaba followed them in and immediately plopped down beside Terazuma.  They seemed to be the only two other shinigami that were not out of the office working on a case of some kind, and if Konoe had gathered all of them, what he had to say had to be of some importance.  Hisoka wondered what was going on.

"What's up?" he asked, taking his seat beside Tsuzuki.  The older shinigami had smuggled in a few chocolate chip cookies and was attempt to take discrete bites without Konoe noticing.

"We called you all together to introduce you to someone," Konoe explained.  "Oh, and Tsuzuki?  Cookies.  Table.  Now."

Tsuzuki sighed long and hard, but did as he was instructed and put the smuggled cookies on the table.

"As I was saying," Konoe continued, "we brought you together to introduce you to the newest of the shinigami."

Tsuzuki looked around.  "I don't see anybody," he said.  Terazuma made some kind of comment below his breath, but fortunately, Tsuzuki did not catch wind of it.  Otherwise the entire building would be brought down by their battling shikigami like it once had before.

The door opened and Watari burst in, a cheerful smile on his face, as always.

"Got him, Kachou!" he said, as though he had made some kind of great accomplishment.  He moved aside from the doorframe and made a vague gesture of his hand.  "Your new shinigami, sir."

Another person, apparently whom had been hidden behind Tsuzuki, appeared in the doorframe.  Hisoka fell over backward in his chair with an audible thunk.  The boy standing in the doorframe blinked.

"Uh, Hisoka?" Tsuzuki asked, peering down at him.  "You okay?"

"That's!  That's!  It's!" Hisoka sputtered.  He yanked himself up off the floor and pointed.  "You're Kaiki!  The guy from Hijiri's school!"

The boy nodded his head slightly, and almost seemed to be smile.  It was in fact the boy Hisoka had met when he and Tsuzuki had been working on the case at Hijiri's school.  No one could mistake that golden hair and those silver eyes for anyone else.  But why had /he/ become a shinigami?

"Shinori Kaiki," he introduced himself quietly.  "That's just Kai to most everyone."

"I'd like you and Hisoka to take Kai and show him around, Tsuzuki," Konoe said.

Tsuzuki blinked.  "Oh, sure.  No problem!"

"Shinori-kun is a replacement shinigami, should anything happen to anyone putting them out of commission for awhile," Tatsumi explained.  "We thought that considering how often Tsuzuki is out of work, it might be necessary to bring someone in."

Tsuzuki slumped as low as he could possibly go in his chair.  "Tatsum~i, you're so mean . . ."

Tatsumi was not insulted.  He simply gave a very slight shrug of his shoulders and proceeded to shove a folder at Tsuzuki.  The other shinigami took it and blinked at it in confusion.

"What's this?"

"You and Kurosaki-kun's next assignment," Tatsumi said.  "You are to take Shinori-kun with you, to show him what exactly a shinigami does."

"Are you sure you want /him/ to teach the kid?" Terazuma spoke up.

Tsuzuki shot a glare at him.  "Yeah, like /you'd/ do any better."

"I've never drowned any of my partners."

"That was an accident!"

"And then brought them flowers that gave them an allergic reaction."

"How was I supposed to know?!"

"That's /enough/," Tatsumi interrupted firmly.  He had the patented 'Evil Look' in his eyes, and both Tsuzuki and Terazuma gave an eep and slumped deeper into their chairs.

Wakaba laughed nervously.  "I'm sure you'll like it here at the Shokan Division, Kaiki-kun."

Hisoka was seated in the office while Tsuzuki gave Kaiki a detailed tour of the agency.  He had been invited to join them as Tsuzuki showed Kai around and introduced him to everyone, but he had politely declined, deciding instead to return to the office and review their next assignment.  In truth, he  had not even looked at the file Tatsumi had given them all morning.  He could not help but be distracted by wondering for what reason had Kaiki become a shinigami.

He had attempted to search Kai's thoughts and feelings, but found that he had some very thick and high walls surrounding him, preventing Hisoka from learning anything about him.  That much was not that surprising.  Aside from Tsuzuki, who consciously made an effort to hide his feelings for Hisoka's sake, many people built up walls around themselves without realizing what they were doing.  Most of the time, people did this either when they had something to hide, or had lived a terrible lifetime and did not want to reopen old wounds.  There was nothing Hisoka could find out, unless Kai lowered his walls, or consciously told anyone what reason he had to become a shinigami.

Hisoka realized that he did not even know for what reason Tsuzuki had become a shinigami, much less the reasons of Tatsumi or Watari, or even Wakaba and Terazuma.  He knew that for someone to become a shinigami, that person had to have a strong connection with the living world, and oftentimes that meant they had to have had something terrible happen to them while they were alive to tie them to that world.  But everyone, even Tsuzuki when he was not depressed, were very cheerful and bright people.  It almost seemed like nothing could have happened to them.

But deaths, though they surrounded them and were solely what the shinigami functioned on, were not ever discussed.  Not when it was their own death.  Tsuzuki was a prime example that even after seventy years of living in the afterlife, he still suffered from what had happened to him when he was alive, whatever /that/ had been.  Hisoka knew that he had been persecuted as a child.  He knew that he had been secluded from others and treated like some kind of monster, until he had honestly started to believe that he was not human.  But Tsuzuki's pain went far deeper than that, and Hisoka had no idea how deep it would actually go.

The door suddenly burst open and Tsuzuki appeared, smiling broadly and looking as cheerful as ever.  "We're ba~ck!" he called, as though Hisoka had not noticed after /that/ particular entrance.

"How'd it go?" he asked.  He quickly shifted a few papers on the desk around to look as though he had actually been doing some work, not just sitting there daydreaming about things.

"Pretty good, ne, Kai?"  Tsuzuki turned to the younger shinigami, whom Hisoka had barely noticed.  He had an odd way of not catching any eyes, which was rather strange, considering his appearance.  After all, how many people had that golden of hair, or those silver eyes?

Kai slipped into the room and gave a slight nod, smiling very faintly.  "Thanks for showing me around, Tsuzuki-san."

"Tsuzuki is fine," Tsuzuki said.  "Oh, yeah, and this concludes the tour, I guess.  This is Hisoka and I's office.  And you already know Hisoka, right?  So no need for introductions."

"I remember from school," Kai replied, giving a polite nod in Hisoka's direction.

Tsuzuki plopped down in his desk chair, delighted to find that none of his sweets had mysteriously disappeared since he had been gone.  He immediately began to gobble them all up, but not after politely offering some to Kai, who declined and took a seat across from them on the sofa.

"So what's our next case, Hisoka?" Tsuzuki asked.

"Huh?  Oh, right!"

Hisoka had completely forgotten about the case.  He spent a moment of two searching for the file that Tatsumi had given him, causing Tsuzuki to raise an eyebrow at him and wonder what was up.  Hisoka always kept his work space very neat and organized.  It was not like him to lose anything.

"Here," Hisoka said, finally finding it beneath a pile of papers.  He flipped it open and skimmed through the document inside.

"If there's anything you don't understand, you can just ask me," Tsuzuki was telling Kai as he read.  "I've been here for seventy years, so I think I've got everything down."

Kai blinked, awed by the fact Tsuzuki had been a shinigami for so long.  "If you become a shinigami, is it forever?" he asked.  "Do you not go to Joukai or Makai ever?"

"Well, you definitely don't go to Makai!" Tsuzuki said, laughing.  "Your reward for being a shinigami is a straight ticket to Joukai when you die."

"Die?" Kai repeated.

"Well, not necessarily die," Tsuzuki said slowly.  "But when we're on Chijou, we're in physical form, so we /can/ be killed.  We'd just go straight to Joukai if that happened.  But say you're already here, in Meifu, when you decide that you've had enough.  Basically you just kinda . . . I dunno.  Take a step through some door and boom.  You're not a shinigami anymore."

"Oh," Kai said.  He wasn't quite sure that he understood, but he did a good job of pretending that he did.

Hisoka cleared his throat, to catch their attention.  "A person whose name has appeared in the Kiseki has not been recorded in Meifu.  We're to find the person and deliver her to the JuOhCho to be judged."

"Oh, that's simple," Tsuzuki said.  "Much better than the last one.  Er . . ."  

He paused and winced slightly, glancing at Kai.  He knew that Kai was the person that the demon had last occupied before he had been able to do anything to stop the demon.  Saving Kai had never been an option for them.  He was simply the person that they had to let go, for the sake of dozens of others.  But Kai only smiled and shrugged his shoulders.

"Don't worry," he said, "I'm not sensitive about it."

Tsuzuki smiled, relieved.

"Well, in any case, it's a good assignment to show you a little more of what we deal with most of the time," Tsuzuki continued.  "Not everything is fighting demons or dealing with serial killers, you know."

"Well, of course not . . ."

"Ahhhhhh!  Work in Nagasaki is the best work!"

Tsuzuki was extremely happy, Hisoka noted.  He was pleased that their assignment was not nearly as difficult as their last, and then there was the fact that Konoe was giving he and Hisoka an extended amount of time to work on it, for the sake of Kai.  To Tsuzuki, that meant it was all the more time that he could spend visiting restaurants and sampling their desserts.  That was, if he kept in mind that there was a limit of how much they could spend, and if he were to go over it, it was his head Tatsumi would have.

"Don't get too cocky," Hisoka advised.  "This may turn out to be more difficult than the last one."

"Naa, Hisoka, you always have to burst my bubble . . ."

Kai glanced between the two of them and smiled slightly, amused by their antics.

Hisoka shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and began walking, leaving Tsuzuki and Kai with no choice but to follow him.  He supposed today they looked less conspicuous than they usually did, what with Tsuzuki always rushing off on a whim when he thought he saw the person they were searching for.  Hisoka could remember a great number of cases that Tsuzuki had nearly blown their cover by saying something quite loudly about JuOhCho or the shinigami, or anything else that would give away what exactly went on in the afterlife.  But today they looked no different than anyone else, and Tsuzuki was doing a good job of not saying anything that would gain anyone's attention.

"So you and Hisoka are in the two in charge of the second block, right?" Kai asked Tsuzuki as they walked.

"Yup," Tsuzuki replied.  "They didn't explain all of this to you?"

Kai shook his head.

"Oh.  Well, okay.  You know that JuOhCho is Japan's processing organization for the deceased, ne?  And that every country has one of these.  JuOhCho is just specific to Japan."

Kai nodded, like an obedient student.  Hisoka rolled his eyes as he walked ahead of them; Tsuzuki loved to explain everything as though he were the amazing person that had come up with the entire system.

"Japan is divided into ten separate Chos.   There's the ShinkouCho, that's the first block.  Then ShokouCho, the second, where Hisoka and I work.  Third block is SouteiCho, and the fourth is GokanCho; that's the one Terazuma and Wakaba-chan supervised.  Fifth is EnmaCho in Tokyo.  Tatsumi and Konoe handle there mostly, since they're the most senior people in the Shokan Division, and Tokyo gets a lot of crazy deaths.  Sixth block is HenjouCho, that's where Watari works, and the seventh is TaisenCho.  Eighth block is HeizeiCho, ninth is ToshiCho – Yuma and Saya work there – and the tenth is GodouteninCho."

Hisoka glanced over his shoulder at Kai to see whether or not he was absorbing any of what Tsuzuki was saying.  He was listening, but judging by the hopelessly confused expression on his face, he was not understanding.

"Two shinigami are assigned to each district or Cho to take care of any of the deaths of people that do not go directly to Meifu, or people who are listed in the Kiseki but aren't dead yet," Tsuzuki said.  "So the shinigami bring them to the JuOhCho and there they're judged and placed where they belong in Meifu, either in Joukai or Makai.  Make sense?"

". . . not really . . ." Kai admitted.

Tsuzuki laughed.  "Don't worry.  You'll get the hang of it.

"Kyushu is the best area to work," he continued cheerfully.  "The work isn't too much and it's not too little.  We get lots of extended vacations since not much happens in this place."

"Worse things than that demon happen?" Kai asked nervously.

"Well, yeah."

Kai looked suddenly like he was going to be sick.

"So where do we start looking, Hisoka?" Tsuzuki asked, fastening his steps to catch up with his younger partner.

"Well . . ."  Hisoka was carrying the file on the case Tatsumi had given him, and he flipped it open to where there was a name and picture of the person they were searching for.  "Her name is Watase Iori.  Sixteen years old.  Cause of death was suicide."

"Suicide?" Kai repeated.

Hisoka handed the file to him, to let him get a look at some of the things shinigami were forced to deal with.  "Yeah," he replied.  "About fifty percent of the people that are listed in the Kiseki but not in Meifu are people that have committed suicide.  People who commit suicide always have something that's holding them back in Chijou, or they don't want to go on because they're afraid they'll go to Makai."

"Why would they go to Makai?" Kai asked.

"Suicide is considered a mortal sin by the Christians," Tsuzuki answered.  "If you commit suicide, their religion states that you go straight to Hell.  So it's natural to believe that if you kill yourself, you'll go to Makai."

"So . . . where do you start looking for a . . ."

"Shiryou," Tsuzuki filled in.  "Usually we look places like their homes, their schools.  We question their friends and family and try to find out where they could be.  Shiryou can sense shinigami and know when they are coming for them.  Most of them run."

"Let's start at her home," Hisoka suggested.  "It's closer anyway."

"/Now/ who's lazy?" Tsuzuki demanded, jabbing Hisoka in the side.

Hisoka shook him off and made a face.  "It's not a matter of being lazy.  It's just closer.  It's pointless to make a trip to the school and then come all the way back here to go to the house."

"Sure, sure . . . lazy."

"Tsuzuki . . ."

Hisoka and Kai glanced at each other in turn, to Tsuzuki, and then to the garments he had been able to convince them to wear.  It was his bright idea that they get into the house by claiming that they were exterminators, making it easier for them to investigate without being suspicious.  Hisoka had argued that it would be more simple to take on a spirit form and search that way, but Tsuzuki was quite insistent on his way, saying that if they did that, it would be all the easier for the shiryou to sense them.

"This is your worse idea yet," Hisoka mumbled.  He tugged irritably at the coveralls he was wearing and adjusted the baseball cap on his head.  "What kind of exterminator goes door to door offering to do a free search of the house for termites?"

"Us, that's who," Tsuzuki replied cheerfully, and he knocked lightly on the door.

A few moments later it was answered by a middle-aged woman, though the lines under her eyes caused her to look far older than she actually was.  She had the look of a person that had only recently been woken up, and Tsuzuki felt slightly guilty, if he were the reason.  She looked liked she could use all the sleep she could get.

"Ah, good afternoon, ma'am," he said politely, offering her a bright smile.  "We're doing routine checks for termites in the area.  We were wondering if you would be interested.  It's free and it will only take an hour of your time."

"Termites?" the woman repeated.

Tsuzuki nodded.  "Aa.  There's a lot of termite activity in the area," he said seriously.

The woman glanced over her shoulder, as though she expected someone to be coming down the stairs, or around the corner to join her at the door.  When no one did, she returned her gaze to Tsuzuki and his younger counterparts and smiled wearily.

"I suppose it won't hurt," she said.

  
Tsuzuki shot a quick, defiant look at Hisoka.  The younger shinigami resisted the urge to stick his tongue out at him.

"It will only taken an hour, ma'am," Tsuzuki said again.  "Since we're working with some heavy-duty equipment though, may we ask that you leave for that time?"

"I suppose you and your co-workers are too sweet-looking to rob me," the woman replied, smiling.  "That's quite all right.  I'll come back in an hour, then."

"Ah, thank you!" 

Tsuzuki shot another look at Hisoka, this time smirking infuriatingly.  Hisoka could not resist the urge for very much longer and gave in, sticking his tongue out at Tsuzuki and then proceeding to put his nose in the air haughtily.  Tsuzuki blinked, surprised.  Kai laughed softly below his breath.

Once the woman was gone, they slipped inside of the house and immediately began a thorough search of the area, to pick up on anything that would tell them more about Watase Iori.

"I get the feeling the father is dead," Hisoka murmured as he walked through the living room, looking at all of the family pictures.  After a certain point, the pictures of an older man simply stopped, and were replaced with single photos of the woman and a young, pretty girl, whom he assumed was Iori.

"He must have died awhile ago," Kai surmised.  He was standing behind Hisoka, looking at all of the pictures as well.  "See?  They stop when the girl looks about twelve.  So it would've been four years ago, I guess."

"Well, it's definitely not his death that has that lady looking like she does," Tsuzuki put in.  He sighed.  "Poor woman.  Lost her husband, and then her daughter went and committed suicide . . ."

"What was that?" Hisoka asked suddenly.

Tsuzuki glanced around.  "What was what?"

"I heard a noise from upstairs."

Tsuzuki frowned slightly.  "All right.  Let's check it out."

He started up the staircase, leaving Hisoka and Kai with little to no choice but to follow them.  The two younger shinigami did, tiptoeing after him as Tsuzuki lead the way up the stairs and through the halls.  There was only silence for several long moments, but after Tsuzuki had stopped and listened for a brief second, they heard another sound, coming from the room farthest from them.  He started again in that direction, Hisoka and Kai following him more closely than before.

Tsuzuki pushed the door slowly open to the room.  It was perfectly organized and neat, all of the books lined perfectly on the shelves, the bed neatly made, and everything in its own place.  It was obviously a young girl's room, that much was obvious by the variety of stuffed animals on the bed.  And seated on a chest at the end of the bed was the person they were looking for.

The door creaked protestingly as Tsuzuki placed too much pressure on it.  The girl's head whipped around, and at the sight of him, she immediately stood and began backing away.

"No!  I don't want to go!"

"I'm sorry," Tsuzuki said slowly, "but I'm not the one that makes these decisions . . ."

He opened the door fully and stepped inside of the room.  Hisoka followed him, but Kai, being the inexperienced one of the three shinigami, hung back in the doorframe to watch.

"You're going to take me to Hell," Iori accused.

"Not necessarily," Tsuzuki said rationally.  "That's not up for me to decide either."

She had reached as far as she could go and stood with her back pressed against the closet door, her hands balled into fists, as though she thought that she could fight her way through them.  But as Tsuzuki spoke, in a soft, rational voice, she seemed to be losing her resolve.

"People who commit suicide go to Hell, don't they?" she asked.  She sounded frightened.

"I don't know," Tsuzuki answered.  "Maybe if they've had bad lives, they go to better places.  You shouldn't be so afraid."

Hisoka glanced at his older partner, surprised.  This was not at all like the Tsuzuki that he knew.  He had seen Tsuzuki be compassionate with those they were to deliver to the JuOhCho, but he had never seemed as genuinely concerned as he seemed to be now.  Hisoka realized that he was worried for the girl, the same as she was, that she might not go on to a better place.  He /wanted/ for her to have peace in the afterlife.

Wasn't that why Tatsumi had dumped Tsuzuki as his partner?  Because he was too compassionate, too caring of the people they delivered to JuOhCho?

"Why did you kill yourself?" Tsuzuki asked.

Iori looked startled.  "Wh . . . why are you asking me that?"

"I was wondering what reason you had."

She looked away, almost nervously.  Hisoka could sense that she was troubled.  She was having difficulty in deciding whether or not she could trust Tsuzuki and tell him the truth.  On the one hand, he seemed genuinely concerned for her, but on the other, he /was/ a shinigami.  She knew that he was the one that had been sent to deliver her to Meifu.  For that reason, he was not to be trusted.  But . . .

"My life . . . I couldn't get out . . . it was so horrible . . ."

"Why?" Tsuzuki asked, gently.

"When my father died, I was so upset . . . It was just me and my mother.  I never saw her because she had to work two jobs just to put food on the table for us.  And then my friends . . . I never had many growing up, but after my father died, I didn't have any but a few.  But then they started to leave me too.  They said it was because they didn't want to deal with me when I was upset.  That unless I could get better, they didn't want to be near me, because it was upsetting them.  I didn't /mean/ to upset them!  I /needed/ them!

"I couldn't live like that.  I knew I wasn't going to get better, no matter how hard I tried, and unless I got better, my friends wouldn't want to be near me.  There was no way out.  So I . . . I found my father's gun, and I . . .

"But I felt so guilty for leaving my mother!  I didn't even think of her feelings!  Dad was going, and she was all alone, and then I . . . I went and did such a stupid thing just because of people who were never even my true friends to begin with . . . I can't leave her.  She'll be all alone . . ."

"Your presence is probably only hurting her more," Hisoka spoke up.

Iori looked at him, startled to hear someone aside from Tsuzuki speak.  Tsuzuki did not stop Hisoka from speaking and allowed him to say what he needed to say, whether or not those words would be harsh or damaging.

"She can probably sense that you're here," Hisoka continued.  "If you stay, then it will only make it more difficult for her to cope and accept your death."

"But she . . ."

"Don't underestimate your mother."

Tsuzuki and Hisoka both turned to look; it was Kai that was speaking.  He had stepped completely into the room and was smiling very faintly, a compassionate, understanding, and gentle smile.

"People suffer when those they love die," he continued, "but they learn to accept and move on in time.  They keep those people alive in their memories and hearts.  But if you stay here, your mother will never be able to do that.  She may begin to think that you will come back to her, and you must know as well as I do how much that would hurt her when you never came back.  

"If you come with us, I'm sure you will be judged fairly and maybe you'll be able to be with your father again, and your mother will join you someday.  Don't stay here and make it any harder for her."

Tsuzuki took a step forward to Iori and slowly offered his hand to her.  "Come on.  I promise you that I will do everything in my power to make sure that you join your father in Meifu."

"Really?" she whispered.

"Really."

She looked from him to Hisoka and Kai, debating her decision in her mind.  Finally, very hesitantly, she placed her hand in Tsuzuki's, and allowed him to lead her from her sanctuary.

"You are most fortunate that the Earl is as enamored with you as he is, Tsuzuki-san, or otherwise that girl may not be in Joukai."

Tsuzuki smiled brightly at Tatsumi.  "I was only doing what was right, Tatsum~i."

He and the other shinigami were sprawled around the workroom, sharing in the wealth of the dozens of souvenirs Tsuzuki, Hisoka, and Kai had brought back to the agency for Konoe.  It seemed that Tsuzuki's plan to buy as much as they possible could had worked, because after eating two pies and another half of one, Konoe had become rather sick to his stomach and was still in the bathroom suffering.  Which meant all the more for Tsuzuki and everyone else.

"That Earl is creepy anyway," Tsuzuki pouted over his slice of carrot cake.  "Why does he have to like /me/?"

"At least it worked out for the best," Kai said optimistically, smiling.  "Iori was judged fairly and able to go to Joukai to be with her father, right?  So she should be happy now."

"Happy endings are so great!" Wakaba exclaimed.  "Tsuzuki, you're soooo sweet!"

Terazuma turned a rather interested shade of red with anger as Wakaba said those words.  "How can you call a bonehead like that sweet?" he muttered, chewing irritably at the end of his cigarette.

"Who are you calling a bonehead?!" Tsuzuki exclaimed, standing straight up in his chair.  Terazuma followed suit, towering above everyone else.  There were collective sweatdrops around the room.

"You, Tsuzuki-CHAN!"

"C-C-C-C-CHAN?!  I'll show you whose a CHAN!  COME FORTH, SUZAKU---!!"

"CH---"

Wakaba slapped a hand over Terazuma's mouth.  "NO!"

Hisoka likewise grabbed the feet of his partner and dragged him down from the table.  "Shut up, Tsuzuki!!"

Suzaku, obedient as she was, had appeared on cue and now sat blinking around the room, hopelessly confused.

"You're really going to like it here at EnmaCho," Wakaba said to Kai, laughing nervously.  Kai looked at her as though she was insane.

"I'm ah . . . sure I will . . ."


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes:** Time leap!  It's a few months since the last chapter, I'm estimating. I just wanted it to be at a point where Kai would be settled into the routine of things and have a partner, so rather than go through all of that, I just do a time hop. Gee, hope this isn't moving too fast . . .

Oh yeah, and the utensils?  Don't ask me. I'm making stuff up. o.o;;

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Five**

Hisoka had learned in his brief time as a shinigami that when it came time to decide on where the agency could go for its annual vacation, it was best to hide in the office and let the others sort out the details.  Osaka had already been decided as where they would go this year, but now it was a matter of deciding where exactly in Osaka they would go and what exactly they would do there.  

This year, the shinigami of the second block, fourth block, and fifth and sixth blocks would take their vacation before the other blocks, which meant that Tsuzuki and Terazuma would be forced to be together for extended periods of time.  Not only would they be forced to deal with their shikigami constantly attempting to battle one another, but the two could never agree on one single place.  Otherwise it might have been decided days ago where they were going.

Hisoka did not care, either way.  Vacations were nice to have every now and then, but he did not get nearly as worked up over them as Tsuzuki and Watari did.  He supposed that was because they had been shinigami for far longer than he had and needed as many breaks from work as they could get.  But for Hisoka, as long as he had a quiet place that he could read in peace and quiet, he would be happy.

He leaned back in his chair, thinking over the past few months.  He couldn't remember exactly, but hadn't it been half a year since the incident in Kyoto?  Almost six months exactly, he thought, and Kyoto had happened six months into his time as a shinigami.  In another month it would be the anniversary of his death.  He would have been dead for a year.  And in another week, he would be seventeen years old.

He hadn't told anyone.  He didn't think it was something that was worth making a big deal about, and it meant nothing to him.  Growing up his birthday had passed like any other day, and that was how he intended it to be in the afterlife as well.  It was not like anyone would notice, anyway.  He may have been, in all technicalities, another year older, but his body would not be.  Nor would it ever be.  He would always be a sixteen-year-old in some way.

Aside from that, nothing of interest had actually been happening over the past few months.  Kai had continued to work with he and Tsuzuki on a few more cases until he became accustomed to the lifestyle of a shinigami.  It had been decided that while he was still a replacement shinigami for those that fell out of commission at any point of time, as long as he was not filling in for anyone, he would be Watari's partner in the sixth block.  He would be coming along with them on their vacation.

Hisoka had still yet to discover anything about Kai's past, much less anything about Kai.  He was quiet and kept to himself like he had when he was alive, but he smiled often and was very kind to everyone.  He seemed like any other shy teenager, yet Hisoka could not keep from wondering what had happened to him, and for what reason he had become a shinigami.  Maybe that was morbid of him.

"Hi-so-kaaaaaa!"

Hisoka could hear Tsuzuki's calling his name from all the way down the hall.  It drew closer and closer until Tsuzuki had reached their office, and a split second later, Tsuzuki burst into the room looking as cheerful as he always did.

"Did they figure out where we're going?" Hisoka asked patiently.  Nothing else would have gained a smile quite like that one from Tsuzuki.

"Yup!"

"Where?"

Tsuzuki came completely into the room, practically bouncing over to Hisoka.  "It's really neat," he said.  "We're going to this creepy old mansion where the people who work there play out a murder and you have to figure out who's the killer.  It'll be fun!"

Hisoka raised an eyebrow.  "Who's decision was that?"

"I think the Earl," Tsuzuki said, scratching at the back of his head.  "Which is weird.  He's not going with us but he picked out the place and everything, and Kachou wants to give it a go, so that's where we're going."  He suddenly grinned devilishly.  "I hope Terazuma gets killed."

"And I'm sure he thinks just the same of you . . ."

"Wo~w!  Wai!  This is going to be so much fun, ne, Hajime-chan?"

Terazuma looked down sourly at the attachment he had apparently sprouted.  Wakaba was latched onto his arm and did not look as though she had any intention of letting him go, much to his displeasure.  That was, at least, what he wanted everyone to believe.  It was more than obvious by now to anyone that Terazuma had a soft spot bigger than Tsuzuki and Konoe's sweet teeth combined for Wakaba, and he did not mind her attentions in the least.

Hisoka silently agreed to her assessment of the building they were standing before, however.  It was the single most enormous mansion he had ever seen in his life.  The building was in the old Victorian style that had swept over parts of Europe and America years ago.  Turrets had stone statues perched on them, either of angels or cherubim, with a few sporadically placed gargoyles to add flavor.  The grounds surrounding the building were beautiful; completely covered with fine greenery, with a variety of plants and flowers from regions all over Japan growing.  Hisoka did not think he had ever seen a place quite like this in Japan.

"This place is creepy," Kai commented.  "Creepier than Tatsumi-san when he gets that evil look in his eyes."  Watari, who stood alongside his new partner, gave a laugh.

Tatsumi raised an eyebrow, but did not make any retaliation in his defense.

"Come on," Konoe-kachou said, "we're expected."

The other shinigami followed him by pairs.  Wakaba walked along behind dragging Terazuma along by the arm and pointing out various things to him cheerfully.  Whenever she was not looking, Hisoka thought that he saw a smile on his face.  Following those two were Watari and Kaiki, who were getting along great for having only been partners for a very brief time.  Watari liked to babble about his latest inventions and Kai was willing to listen.  It was a good balance.  Especially since it kept Watari from testing out his new formulas, as he was too busy explaining them.  Tatsumi walked alongside Konoe, speaking on and off to the older man.  Tsuzuki and Hisoka were the last to come.

"This is a weird place for a vacation," Hisoka said offhand.

"I dunno.  I think it might be fun," Tsuzuki replied with a smile.  "Besides, it's a full two weeks off from work, and that's /great/ in my opinion."

Hisoka smiled slightly.  "Just a few months ago you were saying you were eager to get back to work."

"I said that?  Oh yeah, I did.  Hey!  I was /bored/!  I'll take anything over being bored."

The enormous double doors that opened up to the mansion opened as though on their own accord as the group of shinigami approached.  A beautiful young woman dressed in flowing garments, of a European style, stood at the door bidding them welcome.  Hisoka saw quite a few of the male eyes shifting to look over her appreciatively, which earned Terazuma a swift kick in the shin.  After that he was careful to keep his eyes on anything but pretty girls.

"Welcome to the Descartes Manor," the young woman said with a gracious smile.  She gestured and two other women came forward to take their coats and luggage.  "May I have your party's name?"

"It's under Tatsumi Seichirou," Tatsumi said.

"Ah, we've been expecting you," the woman said with another of her smiles.  They were beginning to give Hisoka an odd feeling.  "My name is Lucille," she said.  "I will be your party's guide for your duration of your stay at the manor."

Tsuzuki had thought that she was foreign, considering that though her Japanese was quite fluent and flowed perfectly, she did not have that certain quality that people born in Japan did, but the fact that she had a foreign name confirmed that.

"You are the guests we have been waiting for," Lucille said as she began to lead them through the manor, through richly carpeted corridors and past magnificent stained glass windows.  "Now that you are here, the game can begin."

"Game?" Kai piped up, shaking his attention away from one of the many portraits that they were passing.  It was beginning to give him the chills.

"Yes, the game," Lucille said, glancing over her shoulder and smiling at him.  "Once it begins, I will be forced to play in character, so I cannot discuss further details of it with you after that point.  But I will explain now.

"Everyone in the game is considered a suspect.  You yourself may be asked to participate more actively as a murder or perhaps as a victim, but don't worry.  If you are asked to be the victim, all we do is ask that you play dead for a brief time, and then we have you moved to another portion of the manor where you can continue your stay.  You will simply not be allowed contact with any other guests but those that have also been 'killed'.

"Once it begins, it won't be stopped.  We play this game as though it were happening years and years ago, so there is no electricity once the game begins.  We shut it off and you will have to use candles to make your way.  The only electricity we do use is that for cooking.  Meals are at promptly at seven every evening.  Aside from dinner, other meals may be had when you like.  And we do always have running water, so don't worry about that when the electricity closes off.

"Ah, here we are."

She had brought them to one long corridor that seemed to be at the east wing of the manor; Hisoka had been too distracted by all of the intricate portraits and carvings in the walls and stained glass windows to notice where exactly they were being taken.  The carpet beneath his feet was a dark shade of crimson and his shoes fairly sank into it.  On one side of the corridor, there were five pairs of double doors, and on the other side, there was a long line of windows that reached from the ceiling to the floor.  Between each window was a pillar, and seated on top of the pillars were carved images of angels.  It was all very beautiful and breath-taking.  Hisoka almost felt as though if he touched something he would break it.

"These will be your quarters," Lucille explained.  "We ask that you have two pairs to a room.  It's much more . . . safe that way."  She smiled that smile of hers that sent a chill up Hisoka's spine.  "That is, unless the lady would prefer to have a room of her own, considering she is in the company of all men."

Wakaba did not look as though she liked the thought of being alone at all.  She latched more firmly onto Terazuma's arm and looked up at him pleadingly.  After a moment, he sighed and rolled his eyes.

"Fine, I'll stay with you," he grumbled, as though it were the most difficult thing in the world for him to say.

Lucille smiled.  "Very good.  I wouldn't worry about getting lost.  The manor is very easy to maneuver through once you get used to it.  We close off any areas that have nothing to do with the game, so you will learn your way fairly quickly. 

"I will leave you to get settled in now.  Dinner will be at seven, don't forget.  The game will begin then."

She left them then.  There was a brief moment of arguing as rooming arrangements were made.  No one wanted to stay with Konoe, whose snore was rumored to sound like a fright train, and since it had already been decided that Terazuma and Wakaba would be together, Watari did not think it was very fair that either of them did not have the danger of being forced to stay with Konoe.  In the end they were forced to draw straws, and Tatsumi was the unfortunate one that drew the shortest.  He vowed revenge on all of them before disappearing into his room after Konoe.

Tsuzuki pushed open the huge oak doors to the room he and Hisoka would be sharing and stepped into the enormous room behind, inevitably letting out a low whistle as he got a good look around.  Hisoka came in after him and looked around, feeling nearly as much awe as Tsuzuki did.

The room was far bigger than any other he had ever seen.  Directly in front of them, straight away from the two doors, there was a pair of clear windows that reached from the high ceiling to the ground.  They were doors, Hisoka realized, that would lead out onto a huge stone balcony beyond.  Through the window, he could see that the balcony itself was lined with a beautiful garden bursting with life.  The balcony overlooked a vast field of greenery.  In the distance, he could see a stable, and the faint shapes of horses dotted the pasture.

His eyes wandered away from the windows to the room.  There was one bed on one side of the bed, and another on the other side.  Both were elevated on platforms; three steps lead up to the level the beds sat on.  They were dressed with fine, royal blue sheets, and even from the look of it Hisoka could see that the pillows and mattress were made of goose feathers.  Great canopies stretched over each bed.  Curtains fell down and were tied to the posts; they could be drawn shut to allow privacy when sleeping.

A door led away to the bathroom on one side of the room, and another door on the other side lead into a closet far larger than even the cellar Hisoka remembered growing up in.  The area right before the two windows was arranged in a living room fashion and had two sofas facing one another, a redwood coffee table between them.  The carpet was in rich patterns of a Victorian style.  Everything about the room screamed classy and magnificent.  Hisoka thought he could stand staring for another full hour, but Tsuzuki shook him from his awe.

"See?  I /told/ you this vacation is going to be great!" he said cheerfully.  

"A-aa . . . yeah, you're right.  Wow.  We can afford this?"

Tsuzuki scratched at the back of his head.  "You know, I didn't even think of that.  If we can, Tatsumi is lying when he says we're in debt.  But who cares about that?  The point of a vacation is to enjoy it, not worry about stuff like money!"

"I don't think Tatsumi-san agrees," Hisoka replied, smiling slightly.

"Well . . . he's a fuddy-duddy anyway."

Tsuzuki tossed his duffel bag on the end of his bed and leapt up onto it.  He sank down into the feather mattress, so that Hisoka could only see the very tip of his nose peeking up.

"Oh wow.  I want to keep this bed.  I think I'll steal it."

Hisoka almost laughed.  The mental image of Tsuzuki attempting to smuggle a bed of that size out of the manor was an amusing one.

"Ne, Hisoka."

"Hm?"  Hisoka stood at the foot of his bed, unpacking his things neatly.  He had always been somewhat of a neat freak.

"It's been a year now, huh?  Since you and I became partners."

Hisoka paused.  He had not expected Tsuzuki to remember, much less mention that it had been a year.  He gave a slight shrug of his shoulders.

"Yeah," he replied, quietly.  "It's been a year since I tried to kill you."  
  
Tsuzuki laughed.  "I still say I'd make a lousy vampire.  I'm far too cute."

Hisoka smiled faintly and continued unpacking.  He had not thought much of Tsuzuki back then.  To him, Tsuzuki had been a nuisance, and he felt that it was an insult to him that he was forced to be his partner.  But as he grew to know Tsuzuki and realized what he was capable of, his doubts had faded away.  

He had never told Tsuzuki, but after what had happened between the demon and Hijiri and Kazusa, he had gone to Konoe and asked that he not be given another partner.  He had wanted to stay with Tsuzuki after that point.  Even today, he was not sure why, but he was glad he had made the decision to accept Tsuzuki as his partner once and for all.

"You're the only partner I've had that's lasted for more than a few months," Tsuzuki said.  

Hisoka glanced at him.  He was sprawled out on the bed, feet hanging over the side, and his hands tucked behind his head.

"Even Tatsumi didn't last for more than three.  He didn't like me very much then, I don't think."

Hisoka wondered if Tsuzuki was simply dense or Tatsumi had made him believe that he did not like him.  Hisoka had only been around them for a year, and it was more than obvious to anyone the way that Tatsumi felt about Tsuzuki.  He went out of his way to protect him, and he was constantly doing those little careless affection things around him . . . cleaning up his face when it was dirty, or brushing his bangs from his face, or things like that . . . Tatsumi cared about him very much.

"Thanks for staying with me for so long, Hisoka," Tsuzuki said softly.

". . . baka.  It's not like you to be so serious."

Tsuzuki flipped over onto his stomach and propped his chin on his hands.  "Sorry," he said, all smiles once again.  "But hey, if it's been a year, you should be a year older, shouldn't you?"

Hisoka did not answer for a long moment.  Finally, he nodded his head slightly and continued with what he was doing.

"I'd be seventeen in a week if I were alive."

"I'll have to get you a present."

Hisoka turned to look at him, startled.  "Wha . . . what?"

"A birthday present.  What should I get?  Any ideas?  You'll be hard to shop for."

"I . . . I don't care . . ."

There came a knock at the door.

"Tsuzuki-san, Kurosaki-kun, it will be time for dinner soon.  Get dressed and come downstairs."

Tsuzuki jumped off the bed.  "Oka~y, Tatsum~i!" he called.  "We'll be down in a bit!"

The dining hall was naturally as magnificent as the rest of the manor.  The walls were lined with candles, as were the chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, and the table was dotted with them as well.  Obviously, the crew was preparing to shut down the electricity, and they wanted the room to be well lit while their patrons had their meal.

They had not been told that it was necessary to dress properly for dinner, but taking a look around at the other guests, Hisoka was glad that Wakaba had convinced them to dress like gentleman.  Even Terazuma had been forced into a suit, much to his displeasure.  Kai seemed to agree with Terazuma on that issue and kept tugging irritably at his collar.  Watari kept having to adjust it for him when he pulled it too loose or managed somehow to lose his tie.  Konoe, Tatsumi, and Tsuzuki were the only ones that seemed to be comfortable, and that was because they wore suits on a daily basis without complaint.

Lucille appeared and lead them to their table.  Hisoka was comforted that all of the guests were not forced to be seated together; otherwise he had the feeling he would be very uncomfortable.  But it seemed that each party had a certain person in charge of taking care of them, and that person set up their dining area for them and made sure that everything flowed properly.  Lucille seated them all before disappearing again, explaining that she was going to retrieve the appetizer.

Tsuzuki leaned over and nudged Hisoka.  "We're supposed to use /all/ of these?" he asked, gesturing to all of the utensils.

"All classic dinners have all these," Hisoka said.

"I'd love to have some chopsticks right now . . ."

"That one is the salad fork," Hisoka said, pointing, "and that's the appetizer fork, and that one next to it is your dinner fork.  On the other side is your steak knife, then your butter knife, and at the top of the plate is your dessert spoon."

Tsuzuki blinked.  "How come you know all that?"

"I was trained in dinner etiquette."

"Oh."

Lucille appeared and served them their appetizer, which Hisoka explained to everyone was a European delicacy called caviar.  Once Kai had asked what /that/ was, however, and he had replied that it was fish eggs, no one looked quite as hungry as they had to begin with.

Fortunately, a soup was brought out not long after that, and it was nothing unusual.  Following soup was a salad, and then the main course came, which was another European delicacy.  Fortunately, this one was far more appetizing than fish eggs, and it was not long before everyone was pushing their plates away and giving sighs of contentment.

"Attention please!" a young woman called.  She was standing at the head of the room and waving her hand around to catch the attention of all of the guests.  Once she had everyone's attention, she smiled brightly and graciously.  "Thank you all very much for choosing to stay at the Descartes Manor.  I am to announce to you that the game begins at this very moment.  Remember that everyone is a suspect and could possibly be the killer, even the very person you are sitting next to right now.  I hope you all enjoy your stay and the game."

As she finished speaking, a crack resounded through the air, and suddenly all of the electrical lights faded out.  They were not blanketed in darkness, fortunately, as all of the candles made the room well lit, though a bit dimmer than before.  Wakaba let out a squeak and latched onto Terazuma's arm, and through the flicker of a candle flame, Hisoka could see a slight smirk on his face.

"Do everyone be careful on their way back to their rooms this evening," the young woman from before suggested.  "The grounds are yours for the remainder of the evening.  Breakfast will be served tomorrow at nine, for those that wish to have it.  I and the other servants bid you good night."

She and a line of other servants, dressed similarly to she, both male and female alike, slipped out of the room.  Hisoka saw Lucille follow them, but she spared them a look before disappearing from the dining hall, and smiled slightly in his direction.  This time it was not quite as much of a creepy smile as it had been before, but a simple bright, cheerful one.  He realized that she must have been playing a part when she had been showing them around the manor, attempting to set the mood of the game.

Tsuzuki suddenly poked him in the side, pulling his attention away.  "C'mon, Hisoka, let's check this place out."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Hisoka asked.

  
Watari laughed.  "Yeah, the murderer might try to come and get us."

Kai looked decidedly put out at that comment.  "This really /is/ creepier than Tatsumi-san . . ."

In the end, Konoe-kachou decided to retire for the evening, and Tatsumi chose to accompany him, saying something vague about how it would be improper to allow his boss to walk these halls alone and worse yet, possibly die at the hands of their murder.  Terazuma and Wakaba remained behind, if only because Wakaba was of the opinion that it was safer to be in numbers, and Terazuma was not about to tell her no.  Watari took a few of the candles from the table and handed them to everyone.

"Well, let's go take a peek around now, shall we?" he said cheerfully.

Voted as their unofficial leader, Watari lead the way through the manor, with Kai following closely behind him, and then by Terazuma and Wakaba.  Tsuzuki and Hisoka kept up with the group, but followed at a few paces behind Terazuma and Wakaba, to allow some privacy for conversation.  Hisoka could not help but think there was something intimate about that, and it made him blush to think so, but fortunately, Tsuzuki did not seem to think the same, nor did he notice the blush.

"You know," Tsuzuki said conversationally, holding up his candle to take a better look at portrait, "it's not this murderer that's got me worried.  It's all these pictures.  They're /creepy/."

Hisoka had to agree that they were creepy.  There were dozens and dozens of pictures of people that were unrecognizable, people from ages ago, all dressed in strict clothing and looking impossibly stiff.  What was disconcerting about the pictures was that as he walked, the eyes seemed to follow him, as though someone were watching through at them.  Hisoka unconsciously stepped closer to Tsuzuki.

"So no ideas on what you want for your birthday, huh, Hisoka?" Tsuzuki asked.

"Huh?"  Hisoka blinked and looked up at him.  "Oh . . . well . . . I've forgotten what it was like to have a birthday," he admitted softly.  "I was seven when my parents . . . well, did what they did.  I can't really remember anything earlier than that.  I remember my mother would make a cake, and my father would come home early from work . . . it was the only day of the year he was ever kind to me."

He stopped, realizing how much he had just said and admitted to Tsuzuki.  "I don't remember what kind of presents I was given," he concluded quickly, hoping that covered it up, but knowing that it wouldn't.

Tsuzuki did not say anything for several long moments.  Hisoka could feel his cheeks burning with anger, not anger directed at Tsuzuki, but at himself for having revealed so much.

"I never celebrated my birthday after my neesan died," Tsuzuki said suddenly.  Hisoka looked up at him, startled to hear him say those words, but Tsuzuki did not seem to notice his eyes on him.  "When I was growing up, Ruka always made a big deal out of it.  We didn't have much money, so she couldn't afford to buy me anything, but she would always make me a really great cake from scratch.  That's the best kind, you know, when someone really puts an effort into it . . . and she and I would sit outside under the stars and talk and that'd be it.  But it was the best kind of birthday I've ever had."

"Tsuzuki . . ."

Hisoka stopped suddenly and looked around.  He could no longer hear the voices of Terazuma and Wakaba, and certainly not those of Watari and Kai.  Tsuzuki realized it as well, as he had stopped beside him, and was looking around the dark corridor with an almost suspicious gleam in his eyes.

"They couldn't have gotten that far ahead of us," Hisoka said.  "Let's just keep going and we'll find them."

Tsuzuki's frown did not vanish, but he gave a slight nod of agreement and continued walking.  If it were at all possible, Hisoka walked closer to him than he had before.  Whether or not it was just a silly game and they had been taken by the staff as victims, he could not help but be frightened.  Not that he would ever admit that he was aloud, but still.  It was very strange when your friends suddenly disappeared without a word.

"Hisoka, if you're the killer, you'll tell me, ne?"

Hisoka blinked at him.  "What if /you're/ the killer?"

"I'd tell you if I was!" Tsuzuki exclaimed, sounding insulted.

"Sure you would."

"I would.  That way I could have an accomplice."  Tsuzuki flashed him a grin.  "Who would suspect the cute one anyway?"

Hisoka stared at him a moment.  And then he began to blush, and to hide it from Tsuzuki, he quickly ducked his head and mumbled some kind of response.

"Okay . . ." Tsuzuki said slowly.  "Is it just me, or did this corridor just end?"

The younger shinigami looked up.  He could not see very well in the dimly lit hallway with only two candles to guide their way, but he held up his candle to search the area.  Tsuzuki was right; the corridor had ended.  And it did not turn off to lead to either the left or the right.  It simply stopped.

"Hold this," Tsuzuki instructed, handing him his candle.  Once Hisoka held it in his hand, he reached out with both of his hands and pushed against the wall.  Nothing happened.  Experimentally, he tried it with the wall directly opposite to the one before him.  Again, nothing happened, and as a last resort, he tried the wall that Hisoka stood the closest too.  This time something happened.  It slid open, revealing a hidden passageway.

". . . Tsuzuki, this is way creepy," Hisoka said slowly, staring up at the flight of stairs.

"I dunno.  I think it's kinda fun," his partner replied, always cheerful in the face of danger.  He started up the stairs, leaving Hisoka with no choice but to follow.

They continued until it seemed to Hisoka that their climb would never end.  Tsuzuki continued to walk as though it were of no difficulty for him, much to Hisoka's irritation.  But he continued to trek along, refusing to allow Tsuzuki to get the better of him at such a minor thing.

At last, when it seemed that his knees would buckle beneath them, the staircase ended.  They had come to a door at the top of the flight.  It was not a very remarkable door at all, just a simple thing made of oak wood.  Tsuzuki frowned and looked down at Hisoka.

"Should we knock?" he asked.

"It's probably just a janitor's closet or something," Hisoka mumbled between attempts to catch his breath.

Tsuzuki shrugged and turned the doorknob.  The door swung open quite easily, leaving them to stare into the room that lay beyond.

It was magnificent.  The carpet was unlike any other they had seen throughout the entire manor.  It was embroidered to be like a stained glass window, so that the bright, colorful threads made a pattern on the floor, all it surrounding one central point in the very center of the room.  The image was of a bright angel, wings outspread, and hands reaching to the heavens.

The far end of the room was a long line of windows, from wall to wall, all stretching from ceiling to the floor and overlooking the manor grounds at night.  It was furnished wonderfully, with every item made of a redwood that gleamed in the light of hundreds upon hundred of candles.  A pair of sofas were in the center of the room, facing the angel embroidered into the carpet.  To one side there was a bed, and to the other were rows upon rows of bookshelves.

Tsuzuki took a hesitant step into the room, calling aloud, "Um . . . excuse me, is anybody here?"

Hisoka heard the rustle of movement before Tsuzuki did.  The sound became louder as the person drew closer and closer to them, and as the person neared, Hisoka began to feel even worse of a feeling in the pit of his stomach.  He reached out, unconscious of his movements, and gripped Tsuzuki's sleeve in hand, almost to comfort himself that Tsuzuki was there and would not leave him.

The person appeared a moment later, silhouetted by the moonlight streaming in through the windows.

"Good evening, Tsuzuki-san.  I was hoping that you would come."

Hisoka felt Tsuzuki stiffen the second before he was swept over by a flash of brilliant emotions and images, all of them racing through his mind at a mile per second, and all of them overwhelming him so much that he wanted to fall on the ground and cry out in pain.  It was Tsuzuki's voice, filled with contempt and anger, that brought him back to reality.

"Muraki."


	7. Chapter Seven

**Notes:** I get kinda Memento-ish in this chapter. ^^ If you've seen the movie, you'll know what I mean.

I had the comment left that apparently when touched by women, Terazuma becomes er . . . the shikigami in him, I guess.  If that's true, then I wasn't aware of it.  I know enough about him to know that his shikigami is a part of him, but I didn't know that it could come out like that.  Like I've said, I'm more familiar with the TV series than the manga, so . . . yeah.  Please excuse that Wakaba is able to constantly glomp on him with no problem.  Maybe he's built up a resistance with her or something.

Oh, and I know that Tsuzuki calls Suzaku 'neesan' but since I have that as what he calls his sister . . . there's just a minor difference of him calling her 'Suzaku-neechan.' ^^

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Six**

Hisoka was of the opinion that the moment they saw and heard Muraki's voice, it would have been in their best interests to turn and bolt right back down the stairs.  Tsuzuki had not seemed to agree, however, and he was still rather mind-boggled at how they had quite suddenly been pulled into the secret room, sat down at a table, and served tea by Muraki.  Tsuzuki had put up no fight at all, and as long as he did nothing, Hisoka was not about to start something.  Whatever Tsuzuki was doing, he trusted him.

Muraki was the same as he remembered him.  The same glasses, the same metallic silver hair, the same obsession with wearing pristine white clothing.  He was a gracious host, as he had always been, and polite to a point.  Hisoka found it infuriating how calm and composed he was.  It did not seem to suit the personality of a serial killer at all.  Not that he had ever known many homicidal maniacs, but Muraki's personality simply did not match up to the image of one in his mind.

"I read about this establishment in a magazine," Muraki was saying.  "It intrigued me, so I thought that I might see what it was all about.  I am surprised to see you and the boy here, though, Tsuzuki-san."

That yet another feature of Muraki's personality that irritated him.  The man had tortured him for three years, marked him with the curse that was still on his body to this day, done God only knew what else to him, and finally murdered him, and yet he could not seem to call him by name.  He was polite with everyone else, with Tsuzuki and Tatsumi, but not with him.  Hisoka took that was a direct insult.

"More tea, boy?" Muraki asked, glancing at him.

Hisoka had not touched his.  "No thanks," he said curtly, folding his arms over his chest and looking away.  He glanced briefly at Tsuzuki; the older shinigami said nothing, only continued to stare directly at Muraki and nothing else.  Muraki seemed to be enjoying his attention immensely.

"He must be a terrible pain to work with," Muraki said conversationally.  "What with that attitude of his, after all.  Isn't it troublesome, Tsuzuki-san?"

Tsuzuki did not respond.  Muraki did not seem to have expected him to.  Nor did Hisoka.  The younger shinigami almost felt nervous.  He could feel no emotion from Tsuzuki, but he did not have to use his empathy to know that he was absolutely furious.  The hardened look of his eyes and the way his hands were balled into fists on the table were clues enough.

"I think I shall enjoy playing this game immensely," Muraki continued, smiling that smile of his.  It was a smile unlike any other.  It was a smile that seemed to promise that there was more to come, but what there was more to come of was a mystery until he did what he was plotting.  It made Hisoka nervous.

"You'll make it real, won't you?" Tsuzuki asked.

Muraki glanced up from taking a sip of his tea, having the nerve to look startled that Tsuzuki had finally spoken.  "I'm not sure I know what you mean, Tsuzuki-san."

"It won't be a game as long as you're here.  You'll actually kill these people."

"Tsuzuki-san, I'm rather appalled you think so."

Tsuzuki, if it was at all possible, looked more furious than he had before.  Hisoka glanced between the two men, one nearly ready to boil over with the anger, the other only continuing to smile charmingly.  If he were in Tsuzuki's place, he would not have wasted time with idle chatter like this.  He would have punched Muraki in the face and broken his nose.

"Besides," Muraki continued, "if I were going to do such a thing, do you think I am a stupid enough man to do it while there are eight shinigami here?"

Tsuzuki stood up.  "Do you think I'm stupid enough to trust you?  I'm not going to allow you to kill any of these people, Muraki.  Come on, Hisoka."

Startled by the firmness of his voice, Hisoka stood quickly.  Muraki followed them suit, but in a much smoother, slow manner, as though he had all of the time in the world to waste.

"These corridors are misleading in the dark," he said.  "Allow me to guide you."

"I think we can manage," Tsuzuki responded.

Muraki raised an eyebrow.  "Are you certain?  You did get lost and find your way to me, after all.  The next person you find may be our murderer.  I won't take no for an answer, Tsuzuki-san."

Tsuzuki did not look as though he was pleased at all, but in the end, he accepted the offer and soon they were walking down the stairs, Muraki leading the way with a candle in hand.  Hisoka kept close to Tsuzuki, as he had before, and both shinigami held back a few paces from Muraki, not wanting to be any closer to the man than they had to be.

Hisoka had wondered what had happened to him after Kyoto.  He had known that Muraki was alive; the marks on his body proved that.  But he had wondered when he would make an appearance again.  It would not be like him to leave them alone after all that had happened to between them, and as it had turned out, Hisoka was right, much to his displeasure.  He only wished that Muraki had chosen some other moment to invade their lives.  Like Tsuzuki had told him, a vacation was meant for fun.  This one would most certainly not be fun as long as Muraki was around.

"Tsuzuki," Hisoka spoke softly, when it seemed that Muraki was not listening to them, much less giving them very much attention.  The older shinigami glanced at him to acknowledge he had heard, but did not respond.  "Are you okay?" Hisoka continued, speaking very softly.  He did not want Muraki to decide to invade their conversation.

Tsuzuki shrugged slightly and gave no definite response.  Hisoka thought to try again, to gain some word out of him, but he realized that Tsuzuki was not in a mood that would allow him to speak rationally or calmly.  Nor did Hisoka want to anger him more somehow, and for that reason, he kept his mouth shut and his thoughts contained to his own mind.

"Now that I stop and think, it will not be long before the anniversary of your death, will it, boy?" Muraki asked suddenly, conversationally.  Hisoka stiffened.

"Shut up, Muraki," Tsuzuki said quietly, but he was able to put his point across effectively.  Muraki chuckled softly under his breath, murmured something about an apology, and continued to lead them through the corridors.  Hisoka's muscles loosened somewhat.

What seemed an eternity later they had arrived at the long corridor where the shinigami were staying.  Muraki smiled charmingly, infuriatingly.

"I do hope I will see you again, Tsuzuki-san," he said.  He glanced slightly at Hisoka.  "Preferably alone.  You and I have much to talk about."

Hisoka glanced at Tsuzuki.  He was not going to take him up on that offer, was he?  Would he?

"Good night, Muraki," was what he said curtly, and with that he turned and went into the room he and Hisoka shared.  Hisoka did not waste a single moment to follow him and deadbolt the door behind them.

"I'm going to take a shower," Tsuzuki said, and he disappeared into the bathroom, leaving Hisoka alone in the enormous room.

The younger shinigami let out a sigh and padded softly across the room to his bed.  He sat down on the steps leading up to it, folding his arms over his knees and resting his chin there.  A moment later the shower water began running.  Hisoka closed his eyes, tipping his head to the side slightly.

The moment did not last for long.  Someone began to knock at the door, and grudgingly, Hisoka dragged himself up and across the room.  There was no peek hole to see who it was at the door, but judging by the knock, it was probably Tatsumi or someone come to check on them.  Muraki did not have a knock quite like that.

He opened the door and found that it was both Watari and Kai that had come to check on them.  Watari let out an audible sigh of relief.

"We were worried about you two," he said.  "If you were gonna run back here, you could have told us, you know."

"We didn't exactly run back here," Hisoka replied.  "We were separated from you guys somehow . . . We ended up meeting an old friend."

"Old friend?" Watari repeated.

"Muraki is here."

Watari slumped slightly.  "Oh, marvelous."

Hisoka glanced at Kaiki.  Suddenly he looked rather sick to his stomach, and not in the way he looked when Terazuma and Tsuzuki began fighting, or when Wakaba shoved yet another sweet tasting thing under his nose.  He honestly looked disturbed by something.

"Kai, are you okay?" Hisoka asked.

"You said . . . that name . . ."

Hisoka felt his heart skip a beat.  "You know Muraki?"

"I . . . I know . . . that name, I . . ."

Watari was looking at his younger partner with concern in his eyes.  "Take it easy, kiddo," he said gently, settling a reassuring hand on Kai's shoulder.  Hisoka moved aside and allowed Watari to lead him into the room and over to where the sofas were.  Kai slumped down beside Watari, his eyes still wide with shock.  Hisoka sat down across from them.  He did not notice that the shower water had stopped running.

"You recognize the name Muraki?" Hisoka asked Kai.

The younger shinigami – that much was true, he was sixteen, while Hisoka would be seventeen soon – could only give a very slight nod of his head.

Tsuzuki had stepped out of the bathroom, dressed in a pair of sweatpants and running a towel over his head.  "What's going on?" he asked, catching all of their attention.

"Kai knows Muraki," Hisoka explained.

"Oh."  
  


Tsuzuki crossed the room and sat down beside Hisoka.  If it had been any other situation, Hisoka might have been embarrassed at the close proximity of Tsuzuki when he was wearing as little as he was, but the situation being what it was, he hardly noticed at all.

"I don't remember anything about . . . anything before about six months," Kai said slowly.  "Everything before that point of my life I don't know anything about.  I dream about it sometimes, but it's always too blurry, but sometimes . . . sometimes I have really vivid dreams, and I know everything, but I forget again before the day is over.  I had a short term memory problem for a really long time.  I don't know why . . . something had happened to me, I guess . . ."

"Before six months ago, you said?" Tsuzuki repeated.

  
Kai nodded.  "I don't remember really how it happened, but I think . . . I don't know, I was an orphan or something.  A family took me in months ago, and that was when the short term memory lapses stopped, but I couldn't remember anything.  All the pieces I once had of my past kept slipping away from me.  But I remembered one thing and one thing only, and so that I would never forget, I . . ."

He stopped suddenly and began to uncuff the sleeve of the button down shirt he was wearing.  Slowly, he rolled away the sleeve from his arm until it was bare, and in the dim light of a candle, he held his arm out.  In dark, crooked letters, the words '_Muraki killed my mother_' were burned into his flesh.

"I knew I would forget," he explained.  "I'd forget the one thing I knew about my past.  So I did that.  I burned it into my skin, so I'd never forget . . . It's why I became a shinigami.  I wanted to find out who Muraki was, and now . . . well, you said the name, and I guess I sort of lost it . . . sorry, Hisoka, Watari."

Watari smiled reassuringly.  "Not your fault, kiddo."

"Who is he?" Kai asked.  "Who is Muraki?"

"An old pal of ours," Tsuzuki replied dryly.  "And I can tell you it's probably the truth that he killed your mother."

Hisoka and Watari both exchanged glances.  Tsuzuki's behavior was not at all like that they knew him to exude.  From the tone of his voice, to the his posture, to the very look of his eyes, it was not the Tsuzuki they knew as their friend.  It was most certainly not the person that Hisoka knew as his partner of a year, the person he trusted and needed.  It was remarkable, what one man could do to transform Tsuzuki.

"Muraki is a serial killer that we've run into a few times in the past," Hisoka explained quietly.  "He was the one that killed me."

"You?" Kai exclaimed.  "He . . . I'm sorry."

Hisoka smiled slightly and waved the apology away.  "It was a year ago," he said.  "Watari can fill you in on the rest."  
  
Watari nodded slightly and stood.  "Aa, but for now we should get some sleep.  Come on, kiddo."  
  


Kai stood, somewhat shakily at that, but he was able to make it out of the room with some help from Watari.  Hisoka closed and locked the door behind them.  

With a sigh, he leaned forward, pressing his forehead against the cool wood.  He had thought, for however brief of a time, in some vain hope, that Muraki would finally be gone from their lives.  When six months had passed with no sign of him, much less a mention of his name, he had only been able to hope more and more than Muraki really would leave and Tsuzuki alone.

But he was wrong.  He should have known that he would be wrong and that Muraki would once again invade their lives.  It was not like him to allow his pray to roam free so easily.

"Tsuzuki."  

He turned slightly.  Tsuzuki was still seated on the sofa.  He glanced up as Hisoka said his name, and for once, did not look away immediately.  The guarded look of his eyes had disappeared and was replaced with the expression that Hisoka knew so well, an expression that actually suited him.  But he almost looked hurt, in a way.  Hisoka took a tentative step forward.

"Are you okay?" he asked hesitantly.

Tsuzuki did not reply for a long moment.  Finally, he sighed, and said softly, "I wasn't able to stop him last time.  What makes me think I can this time?"

Hisoka crossed the room and settled down beside him.  "We don't know if he's actually going to do anything.  He did say it'd be stupid to do anything with so many shinigami around . . ."

"That's just it!" Tsuzuki exclaimed.  "It'd be a challenge for him!  It would be /fun/ for him to kill people with us around!  He may still . . . and I can't . . . do anything . . ."

With painfully slow movements, Hisoka reached out and began to smooth the long, dark strands of hair from Tsuzuki's eyes.  It was a gesture that Tatsumi did often, but Tatsumi never continued to do it like Hisoka was, simply running his fingers through the dark hair soothingly and comfortingly.  Tsuzuki sighed.  Hisoka could feel some of the tension in his body slip away.

"You're always telling me to be optimistic," Hisoka said softly.  "If I'm going to be, you have to be too, you know."  
  
Tsuzuki smiled slightly.  "I knew those words would come back to bite me someday," he said.

Slowly, he stretched out on the sofa, drawing his knees up so that his feet did not hang off the sides, and settled his head in Hisoka's lap.  The younger shinigami was somewhat startled by this, but it was not the first time that Tsuzuki had come to him seeking comfort in this form.  He adjusted so Tsuzuki could rest more comfortably, keeping on hand on Tsuzuki's head and combing his fingers through his hair, while the other rested on the older shinigami's shoulder.

"Hey . . . Hisoka."  Tsuzuki closed his eyes.  "Stay here with me for awhile."

Hisoka smiled down at him.

"I wasn't planning on going anywhere."

Hisoka awoke, rather unfortunately, to the sound of someone beating on the door to he and Tsuzuki's room.  Each successive beat was followed by the sound of Wakaba's voice, calling their names in an attempt to wake them up.

"Hisoka-k~un!  Hisoka-k~un!  Tsuzuki-s~an!"

Hisoka did not think that he wanted to get up at all.  He was perfectly content where he was, and aside from everything last night, from Muraki to learning more about Kai, he thought that it would be very nice to simply remain here all morning.  Of course, it was a wish that would never been granted, for the reason of the latter person aforementioned.  As long as they were here with Muraki around, they would not have any peace.  But he was allowed to hope.

He had fallen asleep sitting up, with Tsuzuki curled up beside him and using his lap as a pillow.  He could vaguely recall sometime the evening before having been gently roused by Tsuzuki, and he remembered that Tsuzuki had told him that sleeping and sitting up would give him a bad crick in the neck.  Hisoka had simply shook his head and mumbled some kind of apology.  Tsuzuki had given a shrug and lied back down to sleep.  Hisoka had then stretched out more comfortably to sleep once Tsuzuki was settled in, and that position had ended up being lying with his arms folded over Tsuzuki's shoulder and leaning against him.  It sounded uncomfortable, and probably looked the same, but Hisoka didn't think he had ever slept better in his life.

"Hi-so-ka-kun!  Tsu-zu-ki-san!"

Hisoka groaned slightly below his breath.  Maybe if he ignored her for long enough, she would go away.

That hope was short-lived.  Tsuzuki had been awakened by her calls and began to shift beneath him as he woke up.  Hisoka pulled away from him reluctantly.

"'morning," Tsuzuki greeted with a yawn and a smile.  "Is that Wakaba-chan?"

"Yeah," Hisoka confirmed.  "It's probably time for breakfast."

As he said those words, the knocking at the door ceased, and was replaced by a more natural, simple knock, that had the slightest edge of urgency.

"Tsuzuki-san, Kurosaki-kun, there has been an incident.  Please dress and come out as soon as possible."

Tsuzuki and Hisoka exchanged glances.  If Tatsumi said that it was important, it had to be /very/ important.  They both dressed quickly and were outside within a few moments.

Tatsumi and the others had gathered outside.  Or at least, Tatsumi and a small number of their party had gathered.  Hisoka noticed immediately that Konoe and Kaiki were missing from their group.

"What's up?" Tsuzuki asked.

"Konoe-kachou has gone missing," Tatsumi said, "but Watari and I think that much is simply a part of the game.  Terazuma-san was able to . . . extract some information from Lucille."

Wakaba's brown eyes widened twice their size.  "Hajime-chan!!  What does /that/ mean?!"  
  


"It doesn't mean anything!" Terazuma exclaimed irritably.

Tatsumi ignored Terazuma and Wakaba's antics and continued, "Shinori-kun is missing as well.  But we know at least that he is not missing because of the game.  Lucille claimed that she had no idea where he had gone, and we have searched the entire area."

"What do you think, Watari?" Tsuzuki asked, shifting his gaze to the other shinigami.  Watari, normally almost as bright and bubbly as Tsuzuki could be, had a frown on his face and a hardened look in his eyes, that only intensified as Tsuzuki asked the question.

"I think he might have gone to look for Muraki," he answered finally.

"He wouldn't do that," Hisoka said quickly.  "He wouldn't, would he?  I mean . . . Muraki may have killed his mother, but he wouldn't . . ."

"Shinori-kun has a troubled past," Tatsumi said thoughtfully.  "He may very well have done so.  And if he did, we must find him before Muraki does.  We should split up and search the grounds.  I'll go with Watari."

Tsuzuki nodded.  "Meet back up here later?"

"In a few hours, yes," Tatsumi replied.  "Good luck."

"You too."

By a few hours, Hisoka should have known that Tatsumi had meant four or seven or ten or some other impossible number like that.  Though he did not show it to anyone except where Tsuzuki was concerned, Tatsumi did genuinely care for all of his co-workers, and Kaiki was no exception.  As long as their was a single chance that they would be able to find him, Tatsumi would not give up until someone forcibly dragged him away.  Bordering on their fourth hour of searching, no one had found even a trace of the youngest shinigami, but no one even dared mention that they stop.

Hisoka trailed along after Tsuzuki, allowing the older shinigami to lead the way through the corridors.  It was still daylight, that he could see when they passed the cathedral-esque great windows, but often their path took them to places where there was no light.  For that reason, Tsuzuki carried a candle with them, but after how long they had been searching, the wax had almost completely melted away.

Another dark corridor Tsuzuki led them into.  Hisoka kept close to him.  There was nothing particularly frightening about the dark to him, but he felt comforted when he was close to Tsuzuki.  After all, there /was/ a serial killer within the manor, and Hisoka did not like the thought of running into him in a dark hallway very much.

"Damn," Tsuzuki hissed suddenly, and as he uttered the curse, the candle's flame flickered out of existence.  Hisoka unconsciously stepped even closer to Tsuzuki, so that he was practically pressed against the older shinigami's back.

Tsuzuki began to utter a few words beneath his breath, all of them the words of an incantation that Hisoka did not recognize.  He concluded not with a final word to end the spell, but with a soft murmur below his breath, that Hisoka was able to hear as, "Help me, Suzaku-neechan."

Hisoka did not even have the chance to blink before a ball of flame had appeared in the palm of Tsuzuki's hand.  It lit up the entire corridor and made it seem less forbidding as it had seemed to him before, and reassured, Hisoka took a small step away from Tsuzuki.

"I didn't know you could do that," he said offhand.  "Ask for their help like that, I mean . . ."

Tsuzuki glanced at him over his shoulder and smiled.  "Just another of my talents, I guess," he said with a slight shrug.  He frowned down at his finger.  "And at least Suzaku's flame doesn't burn me like that candle's did."  He popped the finger into his mouth, despite the fact that it would be completely healed in a few moments.  He was a shinigami, after all.

"I think we should go search where we found Muraki last time," Tsuzuki said as he started forward again, holding up the hand wielding the ball of flame to guide their way.

"Oh, goody," Hisoka replied dryly.  "Just where I want to be."

Tsuzuki did not reply for a moment.  Finally, he spoke again, "You probably shouldn't go with me.  I can go there on my own."

Hisoka looked at him as though he had sprouted a third head.  Not even a second head; he just skipped right on to the third.

"No way am I letting you go see that guy alone."

"I just don't want him to do anything to you," Tsuzuki said quietly.

Hisoka resisted the urge to reply that it was most certainly not him that Muraki seemed the most interested in.  "I'll be okay," he replied.  "Don't worry about me."

Tsuzuki did not look at all comforted by his words, but he gave a slight nod of his head to acknowledge Hisoka's words before continuing onward.  They soon came to the end of the dark corridor, and before they stepped out into the sunlight, Tsuzuki extinguished the flame in his hand so as to not catch unwanted attention.   Fortunately, the corridor beyond was empty when they stepped into it.

For someone as scatterbrained as Tsuzuki was, he had an amazingly good sense of direction when he needed to use it.  Before Hisoka knew exactly where they were going, Tsuzuki had brought them to the same corridor they had walked only the night before, that had lead them to Muraki.  It was far darker than any other hallway they had walked before.  Tsuzuki brought back the flame to his hand and led the way.

"I'm almost sure that it was here we found the staircase . . ." Tsuzuki said with a frown.  "But the hall keeps going . . ."

"Maybe it's further down," Hisoka suggested.

Tsuzuki shook his head.  "No . . . I'm /sure/ it was right here.  I remember that portrait."

Hisoka glanced to the picture he was indicating to.  It was quite possibly one of the more disturbing ones he had seen throughout the manor.  It was of a young woman, dressed in stiff clothing from somewhere around the nineteen hundreds, he imagined.  Dark curls fell to frame her porcelain-like face.  The crimson mouth was set in a very firm line, and the green eyes seemed to burn into his.  The paint had begun to chip away in some places, leaving an unshapely scratch down her pink cheeks.  She was like a human porcelain doll, Hisoka realized, and thinking of Muraki, he suddenly didn't like the picture very much at all.

"Maybe there's a switch or something," Tsuzuki was muttering to himself as his hands wandered the wall in search of the secret passageway.

"It's always if you pull the candlestick in the old movies," Hisoka said thoughtfully, and experimentally, he tugged on one that jutted out from the wall.  

There was an almost immediate reaction.  Tsuzuki jumped backward in surprise as the wall he had been touching began to move.  A panel in the wall slipped aside to reveal the staircase.  Another panel came out to block the hallway they had been following.

"Well . . . that explains that," Hisoka commented, trying to sound light-hearted.  He failed miserably.

Tsuzuki started up the stairs, leaving Hisoka with little to no choice but to follow.  The second time up the stairs was no better than the first time.  He supposed that this time it was worse because he knew what awaited them beyond, and he was not at all eager to see Muraki again.  Much less did he want to see Muraki if Kai had found him and Muraki had done something horrible to him . . . images of what had happened in Nagasaki when Muraki had kidnapped him came flooding back to his mind.

"Hisoka?"

Tsuzuki's voice came to him quite suddenly.  Tsuzuki was looking to him with concern in his eyes, one hand resting on his shoulder.  Hisoka realized that the memories must have overtaken him for a moment; that was why Tsuzuki looked so worried about him.

"I'm okay," he said.  "It's not Kai or anything, I was just thinking about some things."

"Can you sense Kai?" Tsuzuki asked, continuing up the staircase once he was sure that Hisoka was not lying when he said that he was fine.

"No . . . not right now.  He hasn't built up walls to keep me out; he doesn't know how.  But I just can't get a sense of him . . ."  He glanced up at Tsuzuki and offered a reassuring smile.  "But if something really bad was happening to him, I'd know.  Maybe Tatsumi and them have already found him, anyway.  Who knows."

Tsuzuki smiled.  "You being optimistic is the strangest thing in the world."

"Hey, being around you has actually influenced me in /some/ good ways."

"Are you saying I'm a bad influence?"

"I'm saying you're not a /good/ influence."

"That's the same thing!"

"Not quite."

Tsuzuki did not retaliate this time, because they had reached the top of the staircase and the door that would take them into Muraki's chambers.

"You can go back, you know," Tsuzuki said quietly.  "I can call Suzaku or Byakko to go with you, if you're not comfortable going alone . . ."

"I already told you I'm not leaving you, baka."

Tsuzuki sighed.  "I knew you'd say that," he said, and with that he reached out and turned the doorknob.

He slowly pushed the door all of the way open and stepped into the room.  Hisoka followed at a safe distance.  It was the same as they remembered it to be.  Same rich embroidered carpet, same bookshelves, same ceiling height windows, the same furniture.  But no Muraki in the area this time, and not even the slightest hint of his aura either.  Somehow, Hisoka was not comforted.

Tsuzuki led the way, as he always did.  The room seemed much larger than it had been when he and Tsuzuki had been here the night before.  There was another adjourning room that Hisoka had not even taken notice of before.  It was in that direction Tsuzuki headed.

"Tsuzuki," Hisoka started.  He could feel something, a very slight feeling, beginning to creep up on him as they stepped nearer and nearer into the room.

"Are you okay?" Tsuzuki asked immediately, turning around to look at him.

"Just . . . I know Kai's here.  I can tell.  I . . . think he might be hurt."

Tsuzuki speeded up his pace somewhat and continued deeper and deeper into the room.  They slipped around a corridor that Hisoka had not noticed until now, and eventually were brought around to yet another room.  Tsuzuki tried the handle and found that it swung open easily on its own accord.  The feeling had become so strong by then that Hisoka could barely stand without gripping Tsuzuki's arm for support.

"It's bad," he managed to say softly.

"Hisoka, you should go back," Tsuzuki argued.  "I don't want anything to happen to you."

"No," Hisoka said firmly.  "I'll deal with it.  I'm just not as used to Kai as I am with the rest of you; I can't block him out as easily."

Tsuzuki wanted to argue, he knew.  But he accepted Hisoka's decision as he always did and nudged the door completely open.  It was dark in the room, and to light their way, he once again summoned the flame to his palm.

"Kai?" Tsuzuki called.  "Kai, where are you?"

Hisoka heard a slight sound coming from further away.  Tsuzuki went immediately in that direction, Hisoka on his heels.  At the far end of the room, near a window that beamed light in on one central point of the bare, dank room, there was a simple table.  Nothing particularly extraordinary about it at all, except for the fact that Kai was on it, and fastened on it in cruciform style.  Hisoka recognized at once the wires that bound him to the table; they were the same that Muraki had once used on him.

"Hold on, Kai, we'll have you out of here in a second," Tsuzuki said reassuringly, and he immediately set to working away the wires, ignoring when they pricked his own skin and made him bleed.  Hisoka helped him by starting on the side opposite of Tsuzuki.

"I'm sorry . . ."  Kai was speaking, but they could barely hear him.  His voice barely raised a pitch over a faint whisper.  "I had to . . . see who he was . . . that man . . . I bet Watari is mad at me . . ."

"He'll be ecstatic you're okay," Hisoka said, unwinding another wire and tossing it aside.

"It was stupid to go alone . . ." Kai continued, and Hisoka wondered whether or not he was delirious or simply attempting to remain conscious.  "I didn't really . . . even /do/ anything . . . next thing I knew I was being strapped down here . . . and he was just /smiling/ at me . . ."

"Yeah, that's Muraki," Hisoka said under his breath.  "There, that's the last of it.  Can you stand?"

Kai attempted to prop himself up and inevitably failed.  Tsuzuki put an arm around him to support him, and with Hisoka's help, they were able to move him down from the table.  He tried for a moment to stand on his own two feet, but that too was an inevitable failure.  Tsuzuki ended up sweeping the small shinigami up into his arms to carry him.

"Let's get back," he said softly.

But it was, of course, by a stroke of that dreaded thing called irony, that at that moment their enemy chose to make his appearance.

"Tsuzuki-san, don't be in such a hurry.  Now is when the fun starts to begin."


	8. Chapter Eight

**Notes:** Warnings for general Muraki creepiness.  But that doesn't really need much of a warning.  And Hisoka nekkidness.  But that's not really described and detail.  And Tsuzuki doesn't look long enough to appreciate it.

Oh, and I think, because Tsuzuki has been around as a shinigami longer than Terazuma, that's why it's disrespectful when Terazuma attaches even –san or –chan to his name . . . and he's said sempai in reference to Tsuzuki in the manga, so I'm using that.  Of course, he's not saying it with any /respect/ but still . . .

I apologize for the briefness of this chapter and uh . . . the odd ending. ^^

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Seven**

It was a sporadic occasion that Hisoka was able to see Tsuzuki quite like he was at this moment.  The carefree, laid-back shinigami he had been partnered with for a year had disappeared and was replaced by that rare person that Hisoka did not know the way he knew Tsuzuki.  His eyes had narrowed, his lips had formed a thin line, and he looked in all outward appearances quite like he was about the tear this room to pieces if Muraki stood in their way.  The frightening thing was that he /could/ do it if he wanted to.

"I was quite intrigued when this boy came to me."  Muraki made a vague gesture of his hand toward Kai, who remained limp in Tsuzuki's arms.  His wounds were beginning to heal, but not quickly enough that neither Tsuzuki or Hisoka was any less worried about him.

"He seemed familiar to me, in some way," Muraki continued thoughtfully.  "But I couldn't recall having ever known him, much less having killed him.  And then he claimed I killed his mother."  Muraki gave a shrug of his shoulders.  "That could very well be true.  I've killed many mothers.  But I know him from somewhere else.  Of that, I am certain."

"So you thought you'd try to kill him, just for the hell of it?" Hisoka demanded.

Muraki laughed softly.  "No, of course not.  He was bait, like many of the others I have killed in the past.  Bait to lure Tsuzuki-san to me."

The barest flicker of emotion crossed Tsuzuki's face.  Muraki smiled in return, knowing that if he wanted to gain any kind of reaction from Tsuzuki, any at all, all he needed to do was mention in an offhand manner all of those people Tsuzuki felt guilt and responsibility over.  It was like shoving a knife into an open wound, and it made Hisoka want to break Muraki's nose even more than before.

"What do you want this time, Muraki?" Tsuzuki demanded.

Muraki looked confused by the question.  He inclined his head to the side slightly, appearing thoughtful for a moment or two.  "What do I want?" he repeated.  "I think what I want is what I have always wanted."

Hisoka did not have to be a rocket scientist to know that by that, Muraki meant that it was Tsuzuki that he wanted.  Why else would he have used Kai as bait to bring Tsuzuki to him?

"What is between you and I should remain that way," Tsuzuki said quietly.  "Whatever you want, I don't want it to involve either of them."

Muraki smiled.  "How very admirable of you, Tsuzuki-san.  Do you mean to tell me that you will stay with me so long as I allow your friends to go?"

Tsuzuki shrugged slightly, vaguely, and looked away.  "You did say we had much to talk about in private," he replied.

Hisoka stared at him.  He couldn't be serious.  Tsuzuki was not stupid enough to be somewhere with Muraki alone.  The gods only knew what the man would do to him . . . but Tsuzuki simply stood there, accepting his fate as it came to him.  He really /was/ serious.

"I'm not going anywhere," Hisoka said firmly.

"One of us has to take Kai out of here, and he won't let both of us go with him," Tsuzuki argued.  "Take Kai."

Hisoka shook his head.  "I already said I'm not going anywhere."

"Now this is amusing," Muraki interrupted.  They glanced at him briefly; the same amused smile was playing along his lips.  "You know . . . I may be persuaded to take the boy over you, Tsuzuki-san."

"No," Tsuzuki said immediately, but as he was saying the word, Hisoka was asking, "You'd let Tsuzuki and Kai go, right?"

"You've got to be kidding!" Tsuzuki exclaimed, staring at him.

Hisoka did not meet Tsuzuki's gaze, not wanting him to convince him to do otherwise.  He knew what he was doing by offering to stay behind.  It was like making a pact with the devil.  But he would rather that he be the one to stay, not Tsuzuki.  What Muraki had done to Tsuzuki . . . he thought it was worse than what Muraki had ever done to him.  He didn't want Tsuzuki to be forced through that ever again.

"Well then, who shall go and who shall stay?" Muraki inquired.

"I'll stay," Hisoka answered.

"No you won't!" Tsuzuki exclaimed.  "Hisoka!"

Muraki smiled.  "Done."

He snapped his fingers and both Tsuzuki and Kaiki vanished from the room.

What little comfort Hisoka had when faced with Muraki vanished with them.  Somehow, when Tsuzuki was there with him, he had been able to not be afraid.  But now Tsuzuki was gone and he was honestly terrified of what would happen to him.  He knew that he was not the one that Muraki really wanted.  Muraki could just use him as bait to bring Tsuzuki back to him . . . Hisoka wouldn't have put that past him.

Muraki was smiling at him.  Funny, how long it had taken him to realize that.  Hisoka turned warily to face him.

"You must care about him very much," Muraki said, approaching Hisoka slowly, "to give yourself up in his place."

Hisoka did not respond; it was not necessary to.  Muraki was upon him now.  He took a step backward, knowing that it was in vain the second his back pressed up against the wall.  If anything, it was a position all the better for Muraki, and he took advantage of it.  Catching Hisoka's wrist in hand, he twisted it up and pinned it against the wall, and then leaned forward very close to him.  Hisoka turned his face away; he couldn't stand to look into those eyes any longer than he had to.

"Do you think by doing this he will realize the way you feeling about him?" Muraki asked.  His voice was soft in Hisoka's ear; warm breath brushed over the side of his face.

"I don't know that you're talking about," he answered quietly.

"You do love him, don't you?"

Hisoka closed his eyes in an attempt to block out the image of what was happening.  Muraki did not seem to notice.  He only continued what he was doing, running his lips very gently over Hisoka's bare neck and then his clothed shoulders.  Hisoka never answered the question.

"Do you think he will come back?" Muraki asked, pausing in his attentions.  He gave a slight shrug and chuckled softly.  "Well, who knows.  It will be amusing if he does.  So I should enjoy my time with you as long as I have it . . ."

If he spoke again, Hisoka did not hear him.  He had learned how to block from his mind images that came to him when a flood of someone else's feelings assaulted him; he had as well learned how to block out everything that he did not want to believe was happening.  And Muraki touching him, kissing him, speaking to him, all of those were things he did not want to believe.

When he did draw himself back into reality, he did not know how much time had passed.  He was no longer pinned against the wall in the dark room; Muraki was supporting his weight above him, looking down at him with that thoughtful 'what shall I do next' expression on his face.  His clothing had disappeared.  That thought came to him rather numbly.  He hoped that didn't mean that Muraki had . . .

No, wait.  There was something else.  A distant sound of someone at the door.  Some door; he wasn't sure what door.  He hadn't gained enough of his consciousness back to have a true sense of direction.

"Hisoka!  Hisoka!"

Right.  Someone was pounding on a door in the distance, and someone was calling his name.

Hisoka blinked several times to clear his vision.  Tsuzuki.  Tsuzuki was the one that was calling his name.  He /had/ come back for him.

"Well, this is unfortunate," Muraki commented above him.  "You should be thankful, boy.  I'll let you go this night."

And just like that, he was gone.  Hisoka hated it when he did that.

A moment later he became aware of the sound of the door being broken down.  Tsuzuki called his name another time, his voice drawing steadily closer as he neared the room.  Only a second later had he flung the door open and stepped into the candle-lit room.

"Hisoka!"

Hisoka turned his head to the side slightly.  The anxious expression on Tsuzuki's face faded away almost immediately and was replaced with a very deep blush and the widening of his eyes.  He whipped around and cried, "I didn't see anything!  I didn't!  I really didn't!"

Hisoka blinked and looked down.  Oh yeah, his clothes were gone.  This was embarrassing.

He snatched up a blanket around himself, feeling his own blush sweeping over him and coloring him a rather interesting shade of red.  Tsuzuki turned around once he was sure that Hisoka had covered himself completely.

"I came too late, didn't I?" Tsuzuki asked softly.

"I don't know," Hisoka answered honestly.  "Don't think so.  I'm not hurting or anything."  It was embarrassing to say, but the truth.  If Muraki had actually succeeded in doing anything, he somehow doubted that he would have done it in a very gentle way.

"Are you okay?" Tsuzuki asked, stepping closer into the room.

Hisoka shrugged.  "Like I said, I'm not in any pain.  Is Kai all right?"

"Don't know.  I took him back and immediately came back here . . ."  Tsuzuki kept his eyes lowered, despite the fact that Hisoka was, for the most part, completely covered.  "To get you," he finished.  "Sorry . . . that I didn't come sooner."

"It's okay . . . can you find my clothes, though?"

Tsuzuki attempted to locate his clothing amid the tossed blankets, but eventually came up with nothing.  Hisoka supposed that Muraki had undressed him in the back room before bringing him here.  He didn't particularly feel like telling Tsuzuki that though.  He didn't want him to go away, even if it was only for a few moments.

"Great, I'll just run around naked . . ." Hisoka muttered below his breath.

He noticed that Tsuzuki was not speaking.  Looking up, he found the older shinigami unbuttoning his shirt, and a moment later letting it fall down over Hisoka's head.

"That should be fine until we get back to our room," he said quietly.

Hisoka slowly took the offered shirt and slipped his arms through the sleeves.  Once it was fully buttoned, he very carefully climbed off the bed, cautious of having something seen that he did not particularly want to be seen.  Fortunately, the hem of the shirt fell to his knees, and it was a dark enough shade of blue that nothing could be seen through the material.

He managed to walk a few steps forward before he was grasping Tsuzuki's arm for support.  The older shinigami did not seem to mind.  Hisoka slipped his arm through Tsuzuki's, and with Tsuzuki holding his hand in his own to balance him, he was able to make it down the long flight of stairs and into the darkened corridor.  There, he had regained some sense of full consciousness and could have very well released Tsuzuki, but he kept hold of him.  Tsuzuki did not say anything.

The others had gathered outside of their rooms, Hisoka saw as he and Tsuzuki slowly approached.  Watari was missing from the group, which most likely meant that he was still with Kaiki.  One member had been added to their group in their place, however.  Konoe had rejoined them.  Apparently Tatsumi had been able to pull some strings to take him out of the game.

"Tsuzuki-san," Tatsumi began, taking a step forward.  He did not get very far.  Tsuzuki spared him a single look, and the expression in his eyes said everything.  Tatsumi gave a slight nod to indicate that he understood, and then guided Tsuzuki and Hisoka into their room.

"Will you two be all right on your own?" he asked once they were in private.

Tsuzuki glanced down at Hisoka.  "I think we'll be fine.  Ne, Hisoka?"

Hisoka gave a shrug of his shoulders in response.  "Yeah, we'll be fine," he echoed, more to reassure Tatsumi that he was not broken than for any other reason.  He didn't want Tatsumi to stay with them.  The man was a comforting presence, he always had been, but Hisoka did not particularly want to be with anyone but Tsuzuki at this moment.

Fortunately, Tatsumi trusted both of them, and left them alone.  Hisoka went immediately into the bathroom and began to strip away Tsuzuki's clothing to take a warm bath.  The older shinigami remained outside in the main room, leaning up against the door of the bathroom, to be there if Hisoka needed him but not close enough that Hisoka would feel uncomfortable with his presence.

Hisoka sank gratefully into the deep bath filled to the brim with bubbles.  He was certain that Muraki had done nothing to him, and for that reason he was grateful.  But he was still shaken by the thought of what /could/ have happened if Tsuzuki had never come for him, like Muraki had said he would not.

What /would/ he do if Tsuzuki did not come for him as often as he did?  Tsuzuki had come to rescue him when Muraki had kidnapped him in Nagasaki . . . he had come for him on the Queen Camellia, when the ship was going under and he had been too transfixed by what he had done to Tsubaki to move . . . and he had come when Satsujinsha would have possessed him.  He /always/ came.  But what would he do if Tsuzuki did not come?  Would he be able to make it on his own?

Hisoka snorted softly to himself.  No.  He'd die.  Because he was not as powerful as Tsuzuki, or even on the same level as Tatsumi, or gods, probably even Terazuma.  He had nothing compared to them.  He would always be weak.  He would always need rescuing.  Always and forever would be the sixteen-year-old kid that needed someone to hold his hand to walk across the street.

"You don't have to lurk out there, Tsuzuki," he said softly.  "Come in."

He could see Tsuzuki move slightly from his position against the door.  He called back, "Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

Tsuzuki slipped into the bathroom a moment later.  Under normal circumstances, he would have moved all the way away from Hisoka to sit a safe distance away, but for tonight he remained marginally close.  By close, that meant he had not pinned himself against the furthest wall, but was instead seated on a counter not far from the bath where Hisoka was.

"Feel better?" he asked at length.

Hisoka had folded his arms over the edge of the bath and was resting his head against them, eyes closed.  He smiled faintly.  "Mm-hm.  He didn't do anything, Tsuzuki, I'm sure.  So I really am okay.  I just . . . needed this, I guess."  

By this, he meant tranquility and quiet to relax in, to draw himself completely from the state he had put himself into when Muraki had begun showering him with his 'attentions'.  It was a difficult thing to do, to completely pull his consciousness away from himself, and it was even more difficult to recover from it quickly.

"I'm glad . . . really glad," Tsuzuki said softly.  "If anything happened to you . . . I'd never forgive myself."

"Don't feel bad," Hisoka replied.  He didn't want Tsuzuki to begin feeling guilty about what had happened.  "Please."

"I'm just worried about you . . . ne, Hisoka."

"Hm?"

Tsuzuki was not looking at him, but tangling around a towel in his hands.  "I want to give you one of my shikigami.  So I know that way, someone is always looking out for you, and I won't worry as much."

Hisoka stiffened.  What Tsuzuki was asking to give him was hard for him to give up.  Hisoka knew of the close bond he had with his shikigami.  It took a great deal for him to be able to offer one to him.  But that did not change the fact that what Tsuzuki wanted to give him was out of pity.  It was charity.  Hisoka refused to accept any charity.

"I don't want one of your shikigami," he responded.  "And I don't want your charity."

Tsuzuki looked up, startled.  "It's not charity . . ."

"It is to me," Hisoka said quietly.  "Tsuzuki, believe me, I am grateful to you every time that you come to my rescue, but . . . I feel worthless.  Like I can't even do a thing to protect myself and I /need/ to depend on others.  I don't.  I don't need you to give me one of your shikigami.  If I should have one, then . . . I'll find one on my own."

"Hisoka . . . it's not that easy . . ."

"I don't want it to be easy.  Accepting one of yours is easy.  I don't want that.  I can do it on my own."

"If you say so," Tsuzuki said in a soft voice.

"Hand me a towel, would you?"

Tsuzuki rummaged around in the cupboards for a moment before coming up with a large white towel.  He held it out to Hisoka, careful to keep his eyes averted as the younger shinigami stepped out of the tub and took the offered object.  He waited until Hisoka had dried himself completely and wrapped up in the towel before turning back to look at him.

"Sorry," Tsuzuki said.  "I didn't mean for it to seem like it was charity."

Hisoka offered him some semblance of a smile.  But, "I know," was the only response he gave.

While Hisoka was buttoning one of his over-sized shirts to sleep in, Tsuzuki had already climbed into bed to sleep away the evening's sorrows.  Hisoka finished what he was doing and paused a moment, casting an almost nervous glance in Tsuzuki's direction.  He knew that he shouldn't ask.  But that didn't stop him from crossing the room and coming to stand at Tsuzuki's bedside.

"Can I stay with you tonight?"

Tsuzuki turned and looked at him, an vaguely startled expression on his face.  But it faded away with seconds and was replaced with his usual carefree smile.  "Sure," he replied, shifting over a bit to make room.  "Make yourself comfortable."

He held up a fold of the covers for Hisoka to slide beneath, which the younger shinigami did.  He tugged down one of the many pillows and curled up around it, content to be by Tsuzuki's side and nothing more.

"Good?" Tsuzuki asked.

Hisoka opened his eyes and found Tsuzuki looking at him still.  He nearly blushed under the gaze.

"Good," he answered.  "Good night, Tsuzuki."

Tsuzuki smiled.  "G'night, Hisoka."

For someone that had spent the evening quite like Hisoka had, Kaiki was of the opinion that he looked far happier than he should have the next morning.

Happy was not quite the word to describe it, he supposed as he poked at the gruel the cooks were attempting to pass off as oatmeal.  He simply did not look quite like he had been forced through anything particularly traumatizing the night before.  From what Tatsumi had told he and Watari, Kai would have thought that he wouldn't even have come down for breakfast, much less graced any of them with his presence.  But he seemed, in all outward appearances, quite fine.

Regardless of whether or not nothing had happened at all, Kai could not rid himself of the feeling of guilt that had settled into his stomach the night before and still had yet to leave him.  If he had not gotten it into his head that he had to go and find Muraki, then he would have never ended up in the position he had, and the others would have never had to come searching for him.

But he could not help doing what he had done.  Ever since hearing that the man whose name was burned into the flesh of his arm was in this very manor, he had felt almost possessed by a force not his own.  In fact, he had not even realized that he /was/ going to look for Muraki until he had found him, and even then, he did not know how he had managed to find the secret corridor and up the stairs to Muraki's chambers.  That, as much as guilt over Hisoka, was bothering him, and he did not think he would get over it anytime soon.

He shook his head and forced his mind to focus on what was happening around him.  Watari was talking to Tsuzuki, while the others seemed content to listen for the moment.  Aside from Terazuma, that was, who was having difficulty with Wakaba nettling him about his smoking, but that was nothing surprising.

From what Watari had told him of his co-workers, Terazuma was unfortunate enough to harbor a shikigami in his body, that often surfaced when he was touched by those of the opposing gender, or when the weather was humid.  Only Wakaba was able to take him out of that state, otherwise he was forced to deal with it until the shikigami, Kagankokushungei (whom Watari called Kuro-chan for short), released his body.  Fortunately, Terazuma had been able to build up a resistance where Wakaba was concerned, and did not have to worry about the shikigami surfacing when she touched him.

The others . . . he knew very little about Tatsumi aside from his general personality, and that he was one of the very few people in the world that had the art of mastery over shadows.  Tsuzuki was almost the same; he knew that he was considered to be the most powerful of the shinigami, what with his ability with fuda and the fact he possessed twelve shikigami of his own, but aside from that Kai knew very little.  The same went for Hisoka, whom he knew as an empath, and as a murder of victim, but aside from that, nothing.  It didn't seem that any of the shinigami liked to discuss their personal lives.

"Excuse me . . . if I may have your attention."

A servant was standing at the head of room, waving her arms around to catch the attention of all the guests.  She did not have to wait long until all attention was directed to her; Watari had explained to Kai that it was during breakfast that announcements of the 'deceased' were made, and a few clues given out in the hopes a guest might solve the mystery.

The servant gave her report, but Kaiki didn't really listen.  It seemed like another of the business tycoons staying at the Descartes Manor had disappeared, a 'murder' victim of the game.  Since Kai did not think that their purpose as shinigami here any longer was to play the game, he wasn't too interested.

"Hey kiddo, are you okay?" Watari asked suddenly, jabbing him in the side.  Kai jumped, startled from his thoughts.

"I-I'm fine," he said quickly.

"Well, you're not eating, is all," Watari replied with a shrug.

Kai looked down at his abandoned bowl of oatmeal.  "Not very hungry," he said, and he shoved the dish away from him.  "Watari-san--"

"Watari."

". . . Watari.  Are we going to stay here?"

Watari glanced at him from the blueprints he had spread out before him; another wacky invention he had come up with the night before.  His eyebrows rose above the rims of his glasses.

"Well, sure," he answered.  "Why wouldn't we?"

Kai glanced nervously at Tsuzuki and Hisoka.  "Well, because of . . . Muraki."

"Oh.  That.  I wouldn't worry about it if I were you.  Tatsumi doesn't want us to leave until this game is over.  He and Tsuzuki seem to think that our friend the psychotic doctor is going to make it a real blood fest."

Kai paled.  "He'd do that?"

"He loves attention."

"Great . . ."

It was Watari's idea, if Tsuzuki recalled correctly, that they all relax from their recent incidents with Muraki by sitting around and playing a game of poker.  Tatsumi had politely declined, of course, and Konoe was remaining in hiding since he had been claimed as a 'victim' long ago, and so the other shinigami were seated in the room Watari and Kaiki shared, playing round upon round of poker.  They were of course not betting with money; none of them could stand to lose any with how very little the pay was in the Shokan Division, and instead were using cookies.  Terazuma was winning.

"I fold," Kai said with a sigh, lying down his hand of cards.

"Me too," Wakaba echoed.  "No use trying when we /know/ Hajime-chan will win."

Terazuma smirked slightly at the vague praise, but said nothing.

Watari and Hisoka had already folded long ago; they knew that whatever they had was nothing compared to what Terazuma had in his hand, and they hadn't even seen what cards he had.  But four rounds straight of him lying down a royal flush was good enough cue for anyone to quit playing.

Tsuzuki's eyes flicked from his cards to Terazuma, then to his cards and again to Terazuma.  "I'll raise you five," he said finally.

  
Terazuma raised an eyebrow.  "Are you sure about that /sempai/?"

Tsuzuki glared.  "Six then."

Terazuma was quiet for a moment, contemplating his hand as he chewed at the end of his cigarette.  Finally, he took six cookies from his pile, and tossed them to the center of the table.  Another three followed.

"I see your six and raise you three."

Tsuzuki's eyebrow twitched.

"I see that and raise you . . ."  He paused to count all of his cookies.  "Five!"

"I'll take that bet."

Both added another five cookies to the growing pile in the center of the table.  Tsuzuki's eyebrow continued to twitch; he had expected Terazuma to fold!

"What have you got, sempai?" Terazuma asked.

Tsuzuki fixated another glare on him and was silent for quite a long time.  Finally, he threw his cards to the table, face down.

"I fold," he mumbled.

"Tsk," Terazuma said, and he put down his cards.

He had absolutely nothing.  A three, a six, a two, a seven, and one jack.

"Wha--!  You cheated!" Tsuzuki exclaimed.

"No, I just bluff better than you do," Terazuma replied calmly.

"Don't be a poor sport, Tsuzuki-san," Wakaba said cheerfully, reaching over to pat him on the head.  "Losing to Hajime-chan really isn't anything to be ashamed of.  He's always been very good at this game."

Terazuma gestured to the pile of cookies he had accumulated.  "You can have those, Kannuki.  I don't like sweets."

Tsuzuki's eyes widened even further if it was at all possible.  "WHA???"

"Here you go, Tsuzuki-san," Wakaba said, and she shoved one of the cookies into his open mouth.  Tsuzuki made a face and munched on it without enthusiasm.

Not long after Wakaba had divided up the cookies to give everyone an equal amount so no one would have reason to complain, there came a knock at the door.  Watari did not bother to get up an answer it, but simply called for whoever it was to come in by their own free will, tempting their fate by doing so.  Which was, in many cases, the truth considering some of the insane inventions Watari could come up with in two seconds, or if he were testing out another of his new potions.  The exception to this was Tatsumi, as the inventions seemed to be as terrified of him as everyone else was.  And it was Tatsumi that entered the room.

"Lucille has just informed me of a death," he said.

"That's our Tatsumi," Watari said, shaking his head.  "No hello.  No how are you.  Just straight to the point."

"Who was it this time?" Hisoka piped up.  He had remained quiet for the majority of the day, but insisted on keeping close to Tsuzuki.  So where Tsuzuki went, so did he.

Tatsumi frowned.  "Not a 'death'," he said.  "A death.  One of the guests has been murdered."

This news brought no cocky comments from Watari, much less a reaction from the other shinigami.  If anything, they had been expecting this to happen, what with Muraki wandering around like he was.  It was only a matter of time until he claimed his first victim.

"Who was it?" Tsuzuki asked finally.

"A man by the name of Sagumo Takahashi," Tatsumi answered.  "From what Watari and I learned about the other guests, he is quite a well-known businessman in Tokyo, that does, of course, have a darker side.  He dealt often in the selling of drugs on the black market and was a frequent visit to a bordello where he made his business deals."

"Bordello," Hisoka repeated.  "Not . . . that one."

Tatsumi shook his head, knowing that Hisoka referred to KoKakuRou.  "No, it is a private bordello just outside of Tokyo."

"And Muraki is the one behind it," Tsuzuki said.  "I /knew/ this would happen . . . I should have done something to try and prevent it . . ."

"Don't blame yourself, Tsuzuki-san," Tatsumi returned quietly, exerting that very small amount of concern for Tsuzuki he would show in the presence of others.  "But now we will have to make a conscious effort to stop him."

"Why is he doing this at all?" Kai spoke up.

"Bait, maybe," Tsuzuki said, with more than a hint of bitterness in his voice.

"Attention," Watari suggested.

"He's psychotic," Hisoka added in.

"He's creepy," Wakaba chirped.

"Beats me," Terazuma shrugged.

Kai paled.  ". . . . . oh.  Okay then.  Sorry I asked."


	9. Chapter Nine

**Notes:** Tokyo Babylon reference! Yay! ^-^ Um. If you know Tokyo Babylon, you'll get it.  If you don't, that's fine too.  Because it's really got no point there but just to be there.  And Beauty and the Beast.  I thought I'd announce it before someone else did and thereby irked me by doing so. So nyah. =P I know it's there, I put it there on purpose.

And oi, do I ever suck at battle scenes.  Wah.  Actually, as a whole, I hate this chapter . . . guh.  The writing quality is bad, and nothing works right . . . yagh.  But it's the best I can do after slaving away days at this. (kinda)  And let's not even mention the ending . . .wah. o.o 

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Eight**

It was decided, for the safety of the guests, that the murder not be announced.  Rumors spread quickly that the game had become a reality, but for the most part, no one believed it to be true.  Only those that served as the heads of a party knew the truth, having been told by their servants.  Tatsumi was one of them and had chosen to inform his party members, unlike many others, who seemed to think it a hoax being played on them by the manor staff.  No one seemed to believe that another death might occur.

People could never be more stupid when they began to deny reality, as was Kai's opinion.  Death was around them, and yet rather than face it and accept it as matter of life, they chose to refuse its existence.  He had never known a person – that was, he could never recall having known a person – that had been able to accept death with opens arms.  But he was not a person to judge.  It made him a hypocrite.

He, too, had feared death.  He had not attempted to avoid it at all costs, but like many, he did wonder what happened when death came and whether or not there was a such thing as an afterlife.  Now that he was dead and knew, he did not think it was anything to fear at all.  Maybe that was why he had become so opinionated about the guests of the manor that chose not to believe that a murder /had/ in fact occurred and could again.

He rubbed slightly at his arm, his fingertips tracing over the burned words in his skin.  Muraki killed because he took pleasure in it, Hisoka had told him.  There was no other reason for why he did what he did.  Kai imagined that when he had killed his mother, that for Muraki, it had been nothing but a moment's pleasure.  A moment of pleasure that had ended her life.  Why, he wondered, were people like that allowed to live?

He knew that one of the duties of a shinigami was to make sure that the names of those that appeared in the Kiseki arrived in Meifu.  For those souls that did not come, they were to return them to the place where they belonged.  Or, had the person somehow cheated death, they were to take the life of that person to set them on 'the right path' so to speak.  But it was also their duty to prevent the premature deaths of those whose names had not appeared in the Kiseki.

Why then, could they not kill a man like Muraki, who constantly killed and caused people to die before their time?  He knew that it could not be said that when Muraki killed people, that it had been their time to die.  No person was fated to be murdered.  That was why the shinigami had been brought into existence in Meifu, to ensure that those murdered did find their way to Meifu and were given proper judgment before JuOhCho.

Kai unbuttoned the cuff of his shirt and pulled the fabric away to reveal the scars on his arm.  Whatever Muraki had done to his mother, it had to have been horrible, for him to scald it into his flesh so that he would never forget the name of the man that had taken her life . . . and if that was true, did he even want to remember his past?  Who he had been?  What life had he led?  What if he turned out to be no better than Muraki?

"Hey, don't look so glum, chum."

Kaiki quickly covered up his arm and looked up to find Watari coming into the room, a cinnamon roll in his mouth that he had picked up from breakfast.  He gave a slight wave of his hand as he plopped down at the computer station he had set up at an oak wood desk not far from his bed.

"What's up?" he asked, kicking up his feet onto the desk and leaning back in his char.  003, his faithful owl, settled down on the monitor to take a nap.

"Nothing," Kai replied.  He returned his gaze to the land beyond the window, where he was seated.  "I was just thinking about some stuff."

"Well, don't hurt yourself," Watari said with a smile, and he devoted his attention to his computer and whatever it was he was working on at the moment.

"Is Tatsumi-san still looking into the murder?" Kai spoke up after several moments.  He was always hesitant to speak to Watari when the older shinigami was tapping furiously away at his computer, though he had no reason to be.  Watari was always friendly with him and never minded the interruptions.

"Yup," he answered, not pausing in what he was doing or even glancing up.  "He and Terazuma are looking into it to find some motive behind it, if they can."

"But it's Muraki.  Hisoka said . . . that he never really has a reason for killing the people he does . . ."

"Well, that much is true," Watari replied thoughtfully.  "But not really.  Sure, it seems like he doesn't have a reason, but that's what Tsuzuki and Hisoka will tell you . . . to Muraki himself, maybe he does have a reason for what he does.  Maybe he kills people to use as bait to bring Tsuzuki to him.  Maybe he does it because he's hired to.  Whatever the case, no one just goes and randomly kills people.  Even those who kill people for pleasure have a reason – to get pleasure out of it."

Kai sighed softly, silver eyes slipping away from Watari to the window.  

"Maybe . . . people who kill . . . are really very lonely."

"YOU!"

Tsuzuki did a double take and nearly fell out of his chair as Terazuma came stomping forward, pointing an accusing finger at him.  He immediately flung his hands up in the air, as though he were being caught for a crime or something like that.  With the way Terazuma was acting, that probably wasn't far from the truth.

"I didn't do it!" Tsuzuki exclaimed immediately.

"No, of course you didn't," Terazuma said calmly.  "I just wanted to see you jump."

Tsuzuki glared daggers at Terazuma as the other shinigami flopped into a chair across the table he was seated at, kicking his feet up and pulling a cigarette out from behind his elvish ear.  That was something like the third time Terazuma had managed to catch him off guard quite like that, and it never became any easier to cope with each time.  Tsuzuki was on the verge of slugging him.

"Did you find anything out?" Hisoka asked, as Wakaba took a seat beside Terazuma.  The four shinigami were in the empty dining hall, having a very late breakfast.  Tsuzuki and Hisoka had both slept in past noon, while Terazuma and Wakaba had joined Tatsumi in his hunt for information about the murder.

"Nothing solid, no," Terazuma answered.  "Death was somewhere between ten and eleven at night.  Cause was a knife to the throat.  No fingerprints.  The knife's gone.  Most everyone is in their rooms by then, so no one saw any suspicious activity."

"No evidence that it's Muraki?" Tsuzuki asked.

Terazuma shook his head.  "It's not like he left us his jacket or anything to go by.  Seems like everybody's content to keep it a secret too.  Until someone else dies, anyway.  Maybe then they'll take it seriously."  He said it in a manner that stated clearly that he was disgusted with the way the murder was being handled, and if that did not give it away, the way he smashed his cigarette in an ash tray said words enough.

"Wo~w, Hajime-chan is acting like a real detective," Wakaba spoke up.

"What's that supposed to mean?!!" Terazuma demanded.

Wakaba blushed faintly.  "Well, last time you went around blaming /everyone/ and it turned out that the Earl's mask was just in his costume room under that weird gorilla costume . . ."

". . . yeah, well . . . . you be quiet."

"Watari mentioned running some tests on things Tatsumi picked up around the room through his computer," Hisoka spoke up.  He took a small sip of his tea.  "To see whether or not there's any traces of whoever it was."

"If it was Muraki, he'd leave clues behind, wouldn't he?" Tsuzuki asked at length.  "To give us a way to find him . . ."

Wakaba shook her head.  "I don't think so in this case, Tsuzuki-san.  He knows you already suspect him, so it'd be overkill for him to go around leaving you hints.  Besides, you know where he is already too.  I think maybe he's trying to place the blame on someone else to confuse you all."

"Hey, who's the detective here?!" Terazuma snapped.

"That does make sense," Hisoka said thoughtfully, ignoring Terazuma.  "So I guess all we can do is try and prevent him from killing anyone else."

Tsuzuki only gave a slight nod in response, inwardly thinking that it may not be that easy at all.  They had never been able to prevent it before when Muraki killed people; what made this time any different than those?  He had proved time and time again that he was able to out wit the best of them.  Tsuzuki had good reason to be pessimistic about their current circumstances.

The double doors at the far end of the dining hall creaked protestingly in announcement of someone's entrance.  The four shinigami looked up to find Lucille coming into the room, likely having been doing her chores around the manor and coming to the dining hall to clean things up.  She offered them a sunny smile.

"Good morning.  Is there anything I can get you?"

"No, we're just relaxing a bit," Tsuzuki said, returning the smile.  "Thanks anyway."

Lucille nodded.  "Well, don't hesitant to ask if you do need anything."

Terazuma glanced sidelong at the other shinigami.  Tsuzuki and Hisoka did not catch the meaning in his gaze, but Wakaba, who had known him longer than anyone, gave a nod of agreement.

"Actually, there is something you could help us with," Terazuma said.  "We were wondering about another guest that's staying here.  A Dr. Muraki Kazutaka."

"Muraki-sensei?" Lucille asked.  "Yes, there's a man by that name here.  He has never been before, but from what I hear, he's familiar with the owner of the manor.  He's been staying in his own private quarters and not participating in the game, however.  Why do you ask of Muraki-sensei?"

Terazuma gave a shrug and offered one of his more pleasant smiles.  "Oh, no reason really.  Thanks."

Lucille continued to look at him with an odd expression on her face, but finally gave a shrug and continued along her way.  Terazuma was not offended.  Odd looks were something he had become accustomed to over the years, what with the shape of his ears and the odd markings beneath his eyes.

"Not that it really tells us anything," Tsuzuki said with a sigh once Lucille had disappeared.  "So he knows the owner of the manor.  Big deal.  He knew the owner of the Queen Camellia too."

"But he was connected to the murders then because he knew Kakyouin," Hisoka put in thoughtfully.

"So the owner of the manor has something to do with this?" Wakaba asked.

Hisoka shrugged.  "Well, who knows.  Where Muraki's concerned nothing's ever the way it seems."

A  new voice interrupted their conversation.  "So suspicious," it said.  "I'm insulted."

Both Tsuzuki and Hisoka would have recognized that voice in a crowd of five million people.  They stiffened somewhat, eyes lifting very slowly to find Muraki standing in the frame of the double doors.  Terazuma and Wakaba, who were still as of yet unfamiliar with Muraki, were not quite as affected by his sudden appearance.

"Good morning," Muraki said cordially, a smile gracing his features.  "Tsuzuki-san, I do not believe I am acquainted with your friends."

"And I'd rather it stay that way before you try to kill them too," Tsuzuki snapped in return.

"So you really think I am the murderer?" Muraki asked, raising one silver eyebrow in amusement.  "Have I given you reason to believe I would want to kill that man?  But I did not come to argue my innocence.  I was wondering if you would like to join me for dinner this evening, Tsuzuki-san."

Tsuzuki's head slammed down on the table and he groaned quite audibly.  Muraki continued to smile pleasantly.

"No," Tsuzuki growled, lifting his head from the table.  "No, I would /not/ like to have dinner with you this evening.  Or tomorrow evening.  Or the day after that.  Or ever."

"It might be in your best interests to reconsider."

Tsuzuki straightened himself up, at once becoming serious.  "Why?"

Muraki chuckled.  "Oh, don't worry.  I haven't done a thing to any of your companions.  I find none of them as amusing as I do you.  But I may be of some help to this case you are attempting to solve."

"I think I can figure it out on my own."

"I promise that I will be on my best behavior."

"Promise you'll be chained to your chair and I might reconsider," Tsuzuki muttered beneath his breath.  "Yeah, fine, whatever.  I'll go."

"Tsuzuki!" Hisoka and Wakaba exclaimed at once, both startled at his willingness.

"Wonderful," Muraki said brightly.  "Then I will see you at seven, Tsuzuki-san.  Til then."  He gave a slight wave of his hand, and with those simple parting words, was gone.

Hisoka immediately whirled on his partner.  "What are you /thinking/?  Are you /insane/?"

"Unfortunately, Muraki's probably the only one that does know what's going on here, and who might be the next person to be killed," Tsuzuki responded calmly.  "I'm only doing my job."

"But--!"

Tsuzuki smiled.  "Don't worry, Hisoka.  Everything will be fine."

Hisoka didn't believe him.  Nothing would be fine, as he so casually put it, wherever Muraki was concerned.  Though Tsuzuki did well to hide from everyone else that he was still heavily affected by the events in Kyoto, Hisoka knew him too well to be fooled.  Tsuzuki could pretend that being around Muraki and even having dinner with him would not bother him; he could keep up this face of calmness and rationality.  But Hisoka would never believe it.

"If you have to go, Tsuzuki-san, please at least have someone go with you that can come in if there's any sign of trouble," Wakaba pleaded.  "For your own safety."

"No," Tsuzuki said slowly.  "If I do that, it'll just endanger you guys.  I don't want that."

"What about yourself?  What about endangering /your/ life?" Hisoka snapped.

"I don't mind taking the risk if it's just me."

"Tsuzuki," Hisoka tried, but the older shinigami silenced him by raising his hand in a gesture to tell Hisoka to not bother.

"That's my decision.  I'm not changing it."

Hisoka wanted to slug him.  Or yell at him.  Or do something to express how much Tsuzuki's latest idiotic idea was angering him.  But he didn't do anything; simply gave Tsuzuki a very cold glare, and proceeded to slump deeper into his chair, determined to not speak to him for the remainder of the day.  It was childish, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

"You're a crazy bastard, sempai," Terazuma said, shaking his head and stubbing out his cigarette in an ash tray.  "But I can't say I have any more respect for you than I did before for what you're doing."

  
For once, Tsuzuki only smiled in response.  "Well, there isn't really anything I can do to get your respect, is there?" he asked, and that was all.

Hisoka continued to silently fume, until he was long forgotten by his companions and even he began to wonder what it was that he was upset about.

As evening fell and the other shinigami were leaving to go to dinner, Tsuzuki was sneaking away from the group and beginning his trek to Muraki's hall.  Terazuma, Wakaba, and Hisoka all knew what he was up to, but he had forbidden them from telling Tatsumi or the others.  Tatsumi would not have let him go, and this was something Tsuzuki believed that he had to do.  He couldn't let any of them stand in his way or try to detour him from that path.

It was for two reasons that he went to see Muraki.  One, he did know that if anyone could give them clues in this case, it would be him.  And two, it was something he had to do on his own.  He had to be able to face Muraki and not be afraid, to not remember everything that had happened in Kyoto.  It was the only way he could come to terms with everything.

That was why he soon found himself standing outside of Muraki's room, knuckles gently rapping on the door to announce his presence.  Not but a moment later was the door being opened; never let it be said that Muraki was rude.  He would never leave his esteemed guest waiting.

"Good evening, Tsuzuki-san," he said pleasantly, with the same smile on his face that always made a chill run up Tsuzuki's spine.  "Please, come in."

Tsuzuki did not have much choice in the matter either way.  Muraki placed his hand on the small of his back and guided him into the room, making it difficult for Tsuzuki to bolt even if he had wanted to.  But he stood his ground and came inside on the same illusion of calmness he had executed that morning.

Muraki led him over to dining area of the large room.  He might have done something horribly cliché, such as pulling out Tsuzuki's chair for him, but the shinigami had sat down before the doctor had the chance.  Muraki did not seem to mind.  He only smiled and took his seat across from Tsuzuki.

"I am surprised that your companions allowed you to come," he said conversationally, beginning to pour them each a glass of wine.  "They do not like me very much, I think."

Tsuzuki wondered where he had come up with that brilliant idea.  But he held his tongue.  He did not want to say something that he would later regret, no matter how enticing the temptation was.

"I hope you intend to eat this evening, Tsuzuki-san," Muraki said.  He slid a glass of wine across the table to his guest.  "You rarely do in my presence."

"I'd rather get to the point," Tsuzuki replied, forcing his voice to remain calm and neutral.

"Mm.  Of course.  But I would rather talk.  I'm surprised you haven't asked how it was I managed to survive the flames of your shikigami, and then from that wound you inflicted on me."

Muraki stood and began pacing toward him.  Tsuzuki unconsciously leaned back further in his chair, as though in some attempt to be further away from him.

"I still bear the scar," Muraki said, stopping inches from him.  "And your shikigami . . . I think that it would have destroyed me, given the chance.  But I was fortunate to escape.  That is another very faithful creature you have serving you, Tsuzuki.  Touda, is it called?"

Tsuzuki did not respond.  It was true; Touda was one of his most faithful shikigami.  Perhaps the one that was most loyal to him.  Suzaku and Byakko and all the others . . . they would do anything to protect him, and Touda would do the same, but with one slight difference.  Every command Tsuzuki gave Touda followed through on, no matter what the request was.  Even if that request was to be killed.  Suzaku and the others would never do that for him.

"I think I would like to test him," Muraki said lightly.

"Wha . . .?"

Muraki did not respond.  Tsuzuki did not react quickly enough to stop him as he raised a hand above his head, and without a single word, snapped his fingers.  At once the ground began to rumble beneath them.  Tsuzuki flung himself up and out of his chair as the tremors became stronger as something approached them.

Tsuzuki did not see clearly what happened.  There seemed to be a great flash of light, and then, quite suddenly, he and Muraki were not the only occupants of the room.  An enormous demon, a hydra bearing six heads, stood with them.  It was at once the largest creature Tsuzuki had ever seen and yet, it seemed to fit perfectly in the room, without any difficulty.  Likely more affects of Muraki's magic at work.

"Choose yours, Tsuzuki-san," Muraki said.  The hydra stood behind him, its six heads nipping at one another until their master gave a command.  Tsuzuki was still amazed by the intense size of the demon and the power it had to possess.  He had to choose quickly which of his shikigami would be well-matched against such a creature.

He made his decision in a split second.  Placing his hands before him in a gesture of praying, he said the words of a prayer softly, and ended with the words, "Come forth, SohRyu!"

At once the blue serpent appeared.  SohRyu rivaled in size to the hydra, that much Tsuzuki could see, but he was not certain that their abilities were evenly matched.  That was what he would see in the upcoming battle.

Muraki snapped his fingers once again.  The hydra moved forward, all of its heads working in perfect alliance with one another.  Tsuzuki gave a single command to SohRyu and he too moved forward to meet the hydra mid-way.  The two dragons clashed and in a fury of shrieks and battle cries, attempted to beat the other to the ground.

They continued for an indeterminable amount of time, their masters giving them commands at intervals throughout the battle.  Tsuzuki could see well into it that his SohRyu, though powerful and possibly the greatest of his shikigami, was not evenly matched against the hydra.  The hydra, possessing six heads as it did, was able to catch him from all sides.  It was impossible for SohRyu to be able to withstand all of the attacks.

"SohRyu!" Tsuzuki called.  "It's no use!  Stand down!"

The serpent did not heed his call.  If anything, he began to fight with more determination and ferocity than before.  But Tsuzuki did not feel any better about the turn of the battle.

One of the heads of the hydra moved forward with blinding speed.  SohRyu did not move quickly enough to avoid it, and long, crooked fangs sank deeply into the serpent's neck.  The hydra clung to him, sinking its teeth in even deeper, until Tsuzuki could see the yellow eyes of his shikigami beginning to drift closed.

Upon a command from Muraki, the hydra released SohRyu, allowing the serpent shikigami to fall limp to the ground.

"SohRyu!!" Tsuzuki cried.

"He was not a good choice, Tsuzuki-san," Muraki said thoughtfully, his voice rising above the snapping of the hydra, and the labored breathing of the serpent shikigami.  "Better to finish him."  He raised his hand, fingers posed to give the command.

"Stop it!" Tsuzuki yelled.  "Stop!"

He started to run forward to his shikigami.  But at that moment there was a brilliant flash of light, blinding him and preventing him from moving forward.  It faded away, and shielding his eyes, Tsuzuki was able to see vague shapes standing before him.  One red, one white, one brown . . . the latter two much larger than the third.  He rubbed his eyes, attempting to clear his vision.

"Tsuzuki-san."  

A gentle voice spoke his name and he felt a hand on his arm.  He blinked several times and found himself looking into a pair of blue eyes behind the lenses of glasses.  Tatsumi had come.  And the two forms with him were Suzaku and Byakko.

"Tatsumi," Tsuzuki said softly, in realization.  "Neechan . . . and Byakko . . . no."

Tsuzuki jerked his arm free of the grip Tatsumi had him in, rushing forward to Byakko and burying his hands in the deep fur in a pathetic gesture to hold him back.

"No!  Both of you, stand down!" Tsuzuki commanded.

Neither shikigami looked as though they were willing to obey him.  Suzaku gave a battle shriek, a cry that Tsuzuki knew all too well.  She was prepared to destroy the hydra, or to die trying.  The low rumble in Byakko's throat told him that the other shikigami felt no differently.

"That is a direct order from your master!  Stand down!"

"_SohRyu . . ._" 

It was Byakko that spoke.  Younger than the other shikigami Tsuzuki commanded, he did not seem to understand the command.

"Take him to GensouKai and treat him," Tsuzuki said.  "That is my order."

"Tsuzuki-san."  Tatsumi's voice came to him again.  "We must go before Muraki makes another move."

Tsuzuki did not listen to him.  "Do as I say, Suzaku, Byakko!"

"_As you wish._"

Above the roar of Suzaku's flames, Tsuzuki heard the sound of Muraki snapping his fingers.  

The next moment passed by him in a fury of colors and sounds.  He felt arms encircle him from behind, dragging him away from Suzaku and Byakko.  The hydra screamed and moved forward to attack; Suzaku gave a battle cry, and Byakko a roar of rage – or was it pain?  He knew that he was yelling something, another command, something, but he did not hear his own voice.  And before he knew what was happening, all of those images and sounds had disappeared, and were replaced with darkness as he slipped away.

"Neechan!"

Hisoka and Tatsumi both looked up.  Tsuzuki had woken up.  He sat bolt upright in bed, staring straight forward into nothingness, the blankets clenched in his hands.  Both shinigami stood and hurried over to him.

"Neechan," Tsuzuki repeated.  "SohRyu and Byakko, are they . . . what . . ."

"Calm down, Tsuzuki-san," Tatsumi said gently.  He took a seat beside Tsuzuki on the bed and smoothed his long bangs from his face.  "They are all safe."

Tsuzuki appeared marginally relieved by this.  With a gentle push from Tatsumi, he allowed himself to be lowered back down into bed, and the covers pulled back up over him.  Besides, he had a horrible headache.  He was not about to deny being waited on like this.

"They obeyed your command and returned to GensouKai," Tatsumi explained.

"And SohRyu?" Tsuzuki asked.

"He was not wounded very much.  He should be fine."

Tsuzuki nodded.  "How long have I been out?"

"Only a few hours," Tatsumi answered.  He frowned and glanced at Hisoka, who gave a shrug of his shoulders in response.  Reaching within his jacket, Tatsumi removed an envelope from the inside pocket and held it out to Tsuzuki.  "This came for you," he said.

  
Tsuzuki sat up and took the offered envelope from Tatsumi.  It was not addressed to anyone in particular, but his name was written in clear characters across it.  Tsuzuki glanced at Tatsumi and Hisoka before flipping it over and breaking the seal.  He removed the letter inside and unfolded it.

". . . it's from Muraki," he said slowly.  "He said he would tell me about the murders . . . this is everything he knows."

Tsuzuki held it out to Tatsumi.  The other shinigami took it and read over it briefly, one eyebrow raising slightly as he did.

"Convenient," he murmured finally.  "You should know, Tsuzuki-san, that there was another murder while you were with Muraki . . . this only confirms that it could not have been him."

Tsuzuki sighed.  

"I guess . . . we need to go talk to Lucille."

Seated together in the room that Watari and Kaiki shared, the shinigami (including Konoe, whom had finally been able to come out of hiding after having been a 'victim') waited while Tatsumi retrieved their servant girl.  It did not take long.  Not long after Tatsumi had gone to find Lucille, he returned, guiding her in with a hand on her arm.  She took one look around at them and felt her heart rising up in her throat.

Tsuzuki stood.  "Why?" he asked.

Lucille took a step backward, but it was for nothing.  Her back connected with Tatsumi, and he settled both hands on her shoulders to keep her in place.

"You . . . you know?" she asked.  "How?!"

"An ugly little bird told us," Terazuma spoke up.  "And you should explain.  I doubt the police will be as kind with you as we will."

Lucille, her eyes wide with horror, tried again to break free from Tatsumi.  "What /are/ you things?!" she exclaimed.  "You're . . . like demons . . .!"

"You could put it like that," Tsuzuki said.  "But we're not here to talk about that.  Tell us why you killed them."

Tatsumi was able to keep her from breaking away from him and running away, but he was not able to stop her from slumping to the ground before him and hiding her face in her hands.  He stood, dumbfounded, as he had never been able to understand women.  Fortunately Wakaba hurried over to her and knelt down beside her, putting a reassuring arm around her shoulders.

"Please, we only need to know why those people had to die," Wakaba said gently.

Lucille looked up, her eyes red with tears.  "Do you know what those men did?"  She directed the question not to Wakaba, but the men in the room, as though they were to blame as well.  "The second man I killed . . . he owned a bordello outside of Tokyo . . . he sold girls like slaves!  I . . . I was one of them."

"And the other man?" Wakaba asked, continuing to speak in gentle, reassuring tones.  The other shinigami stood dumbfounded.  None of them would have been able to do what Wakaba did.

"A customer," Lucille said softly.  "He came often, and always . . . /always/ had to have me.  My parents were poor . . . we came to Japan from France when I was a child.  My father's job transferred him, and then, just as we came here, he was fired and couldn't support us.  We didn't even have the money to go back to our own country . . . so . . . my mother . . . she couldn't support me . . . she sold me into that life!  So that I could earn money for her . . . and my father didn't even say no . . .

"T-there was a boy I knew growing up.  He was always so kind to me . . . I really loved him.  When we were older, he proposed to me and promised to take me away from the bordello . . . but when the owner and that customer found out, they had him murdered, so that I could stay and remain a whore for them!  I /had/ to kill them, I /had/ to.  For Taka, I killed them . . ."

Lucille ended her story in a broken sob.  She pressed her hands back to her face to hide her tears.  Wakaba put her arms comfortingly around her, while the other shinigami stood back, not knowing what to do.

"It'll be okay," Wakaba said reassuringly, soothingly.  "Don't cry.  Everything will be fine . . ."

And of all of them, it was Terazuma that looked the most disturbed by the scene before him.

"It has been unanimously decided that for next year's vacation, we will go no where that revolves around murder."

At Konoe's announcement, a round of agreements circled around the staff meeting room.  With their lives as shinigami revolving around death, no one wanted to see anymore of it than they had to, especially on vacation.

"What happened to Lucille, though?" Kai spoke up from his position beside Watari.

Konoe gave a shrug of his shoulders.  "Regardless of the reason, she did kill those men.  She will be spending the rest of her life in prison."

"That's horrible," Wakaba said softly.  "She had such a horrible life, and now . . ."

"Unfortunately, not every story has a happy ending," Konoe replied, tone gentle.  "But that is all that needed to be said.  Meeting dismissed."

"Tsuzuki!"

Tsuzuki stopped on his path down one of EnmaCho's many halls and looked over his shoulder.  "Oh, hi, Hisoka," he greeted, smiling.  "Happy birthday."

Hisoka stopped dead in the hall, eyes widening slightly.  "Y . . . you remembered?"

"What kind of partner would I be if I forgot?  It's been a week since you told me, right?"  Hisoka gave a slight nod in response.  Tsuzuki smiled.  "So then it's your birthday.  And I did manage to figure out what to get you.  Come on."

Hisoka blinked.  "Huh?"

"Come on.  It's down this way."

Hisoka followed as Tsuzuki led the way through the various halls, until he realized where it was that they were dead.  The hall Tsuzuki turned down was the same that led to the library.  Even more confused than before, Hisoka could only follow along obediently and trustingly.

"Okay, close your eyes," Tsuzuki commanded, turning to him.  Hisoka raised an eyebrow.  "Oh, c'mon.  Live a little."

Hisoka sighed, but did as he was instructed.  Tsuzuki did not trust him and moved to stand behind the younger shinigami, putting one hand on his shoulder, the other over his eyes.

Trusting Tsuzuki to be his eyes, Hisoka walked forward, Tsuzuki behind him and guiding his steps.  He could hear a door open and then shut behind them, and even through his closed eyelids and the barrier of Tsuzuki's hand, he could tell that they had stepped into a room far brighter than the others in the library.  If it was at all possible, he could feel himself growing eager to see what Tsuzuki's surprise was.

"Open your eyes," Tsuzuki said.

Hisoka did as he was instructed, eyes blinking rapidly as he tried to adjust to the newfound light.  But once his vision had cleared, he had to rub at his eyes to prove that he was not just seeing things.

There was a room in the library that he remembered having come across once.  It was a storage room, far larger than any ordinary storage room, as it held thousands upon thousands of odd things that the agency had collected over their many years in service.  Hisoka had never thought very much of it until now.  /This/ room was the storage room, and it was nothing like he remembered.

The windows had been cleaned, allowing light from outside to flood in.  The chipped paint was gone, having been redone.  The floor was spotless; he could see now that it was redwood, and a few carpets were spread across it here and there.  Sofas and couches had been moved into the room.  A fireplace, that he had never quite noticed before, stood directly before him at the far end of the room, in the center of it all.

But it was not these things that caught his eye so much as the walls of the room.  They were bookshelves.  Shelves upon shelves, all filled to the brim with books.

"What . . ."

He turned to look at Tsuzuki.  The older shinigami smiled.

"Well, I know how much you like to read, and Kachou was talking about renovating this place anyway.  Back in the day it used to be a lounge, but it got turned into a storage room somewhere along the way . . . so I just asked for a favor that it be turned into a library.  With books that /don't/ deal with the kind of stuff that one's got."

He jerked his thumb in the direction of the room they had come from.  Those books, the ones that the Gushoshin tended to, were all volumes of death, and not at all very interesting.

"This is . . ."  Hisoka did not have the words.  "I don't know," he admitted, shaking his head.  "Great.  Really . . . wow."

Tsuzuki laughed.  "Well, just be thankful that Kachou liked the idea too.  It's been done for awhile now.  I just made everyone promise not to tell you so I could make it your birthday surprise.  But!  This isn't all!"

". . . it's not . . .?"

"Nope," Tsuzuki said, beaming.  "Guys?"

From a corner of the room, the other shinigami appeared.  Konoe, Tatsumi, Watari, Kaiki, Wakaba, and Terazuma, all loaded down with birthday supplies, from balloons to presents and party hats.  Wakaba held an enormous cake lit up with candles in her arms.

"Happy birthday, Hisoka-kun!" she exclaimed cheerfully.  "Quick, blow out the candles."

She set the cake down on a coffee table nestled between two couches.  Hisoka knelt down beside it, and taking a deep breath, blew out all seventeen candles.  Wakaba and Tsuzuki gave a cheer.

"What'd you wish for?" Kai asked.

"If he tells, it won't come true!" Wakaba said before Hisoka could respond.  "Here, Tatsumi-san, you cut the cake.  Hajime-chan, stop sneaking cookies.  I thought you didn't like sweets!  And Watari-san, put the presents over there . . .!"


	10. Chapter Ten

**Notes:** Here I am, working on this again, even if I don't really want to because I've been feeling my writing is lacking.  Thanks much to the reviewer that informed me of Watari's dialect.  When I finish this story completely and go through to make all of my changes I'll be sure to change 'bouya' to 'bon' to go along with his background.

This is the point of the story where it begins to dip into the current happenings of the manga.  I'm not following the manga exactly, but I do take a few recently introduced characters and use them.  But don't read this and expect it to be a carbon copy of the manga.  I have my own ideas about a few things, so I'm just putting them into here.

With that mind, I do try to be accurate about Japan and all of its very, very complicated areas.  I did some searching and came up with the exact locations of these places and where they are in references to the Chos, so hopefully, everything is accurate.

Another random note . . . Tsuzuki's reaction to a certain someone is exactly that of Watari's.  I thought it was cute so I kept it.

Enjoy and all that, and please keep giving feedback.

--translation/place name notes--

**bokken** – wooden sword for practicing kata

**wakizashi **– short sword (between 10 and 12 inches)

**kyudo** – Japanese archery (remember from chapter 1)

**Kanto region** – the EnmaCho district of Japan (this is the region Tokyo is in)

**Kamakura** – a city in the Kanagawa Province

**Inamuragasaki **– a cape in Kamakura, with Mt. Fuji and Enoshima Island in sight

**Shichirigahama** – a beach that extends between the capes of Inamuragasaki and Koyurugisaki

**Danna(-sama)** – meaning master (of a house)

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Nine**

Hisoka had made a habit of waking up at seven every morning to be able to spend an hour or two in the practice room without interruption from any of the other shinigami.  It was not that he minded their presence, but he found it difficult to concentrate on his techniques when other people were around.  Especially when that person happened to be Konoe.  He understood that the man was supposedly a great swordsman and a skilled martial artist on top of that, but some of the 'pointers' he liked to give (rather, that he /always/ gave) were so absurd Hisoka had to wonder.

Fortunately, he had just finished up and was putting his sword – a wakizashi; he had retired from practicing with the bokken long ago – away when someone else came into the practice room.  He looked up from his weapon to find that it was Terazuma, bow and quiver of arrows in hand, with Kaiki following not far after him.  Hisoka was surprised that Terazuma was awake this early.  Unless he was expected at the agency before nine in the morning, he wouldn't wake up until well after noon, and spent his hours in the practice room between one and two in the afternoon.

"'morning," Hisoka greeted.  

Admittedly, he had come a far way from the person he had once been when he had come to EnmaCho.  While he was still reclusive and chose to keep more to himself than in the company of others, he had at least become a more civil person, and that was not even with those he had known for his year as a shinigami.  With perfect strangers, he could be civil and polite, something that had once been a difficult for him to do.

"Good morning," Kai returned with a smile.  He, unlike Hisoka, had been able to settle into the life of a shinigami far easier, as well as adapt to the people around him without trouble.  Hisoka supposed that it was his empathy that had made it more difficult for him than Kai.

Terazuma did not say a word of greeting, but gave a slight head of his head to acknowledge Hisoka.  Hisoka wasn't offended.  Anyone that knew Terazuma could see why he was the way he was.  While his behavior could be communicated as rude, it was more that he had never been properly introduced in his life to social situations.  They made him uncomfortable, and his way of coping was to be aloof and at times quick-tempered and sarcastic.

"What're you doing?" Hisoka asked, stepping down into the practice room from putting up his weapon.  The room was a perfect square, with a surrounding walkway elevated around the center of the room by two steps.  It was on the walls around the room that the weapons were arranged on pegs and hooks and in cases.

"Terazuma-san is going to be teaching me kyudo," Kai explained.  "We're starting today."

Hisoka raised an eyebrow.  "Really?"

Kai seemed embarrassed that Hisoka was expressing interest, if the faint blush on his cheeks was any indication.  "Yeah . . . I've been wanting to learn for awhile now.  Who knows, it might come in handy someday.  What about you?  Why up so early?"

"I'm always up this early," Hisoka replied.  He gestured to the far wall, where he had placed his wakizashi.  "Practicing," he explained.

Kai nodded, to indicate that he understood, but did not give a response.  Terazuma was beginning to explain the fine points of kyudo to him, and he dedicated his attention to the older shinigami and his instructions.  Hisoka took a seat at the far end of the dojo to watch.  He doubted that he would interrupt them in any way, and Terazuma did not seem to mind his presence for that matter.  He simply continued with his instructions, Kai listening obediently and nodding his head at appropriate moments.

Before an hour was over Terazuma had Kai shooting for his first time.  Like all amateurs, he was nothing impressive to behold, but as time went on and Terazuma pointed out his mistakes, Kai began to get the hang of it.  That was, his arrows actually started to hit the target, rather than sailing up to the roof, or embedding themselves in the walls.  Hisoka was glad that he sat behind them; otherwise he could have easily suffered a wound in a very uncomfortable place.

Certain that Kaiki was not going to kill himself or someone else with his wayward arrows, Terazuma left him to continue with his practice shots and came to sit down beside Hisoka.  He slipped out a cigarette from behind his ear and lit it up.  If Hisoka was not already dead, he might have complained about it, but circumstances being what they were, the worse effect he suffered was having to smell the heavy scent of tobacco, something he had never been able to tolerate.

"Kai's not bad for a beginner," he said offhandedly.

"Nope," Terazuma agreed.  "But I don't think he's a beginner."  Terazuma lifted a hand and gestured to Kai.  "His form is too precise.  I didn't even explain to him the right stances to take.  He just knew and did it."

"He does have amnesia," Hisoka replied thoughtfully.  "He could have practiced kyudo before."

"And what?  He retained it to memory somehow?"

Hisoka shrugged.  "He may not remember having learned kyudo, but what he learned has to have stayed with him somehow.  That's how he can do this.  It's like second nature to him."

Terazuma folded his arms over his knees and leaned forward against them.  He chewed on the end of his cigarette, the same way a person would chew on a stick of gum.  Hisoka had noticed it was something he did when he was actually, for once, giving careful consideration to something rather than acting on blind impulses, like he oftentimes did.

"Not even Kachou knows where he came from," he murmured.

Hisoka frowned.  "Why does it matter?  He's just Kai."

"He's just a guy we don't know a thing about," Terazuma corrected.  "How can we /not/ assume that he wasn't the shy kid he's cracked up to be?"  Dark eyes flicked to Hisoka.  "Don't get me wrong.  I like Kai.  But I've learned trusting people blindly can be the death of you."

"Terazuma-san . . ."

"Well."  Terazuma stood and stretched out his arms behind his back, giving a great yawn as he did.  "That's just what I think.  Even if he was in the mafia or a murderer or whatever, I don't care.  He's just Kai."

Hisoka smiled.  "Aa."

"Na, Kai, careful!" Terazuma called, turning away from the younger shinigami.  "You're going to shoot Kachou in the ass."

Kai blinked and turned around.  Not thinking, he released his arrow, sending it sailing straight over the target and dangerously close to piercing Konoe, who had been approaching from the other direction.  Hisoka blinked.  Neither he nor Kai would have noticed the approach of the chief, but with his heightened senses, Terazuma had known long before either of them that he was coming.

"I-I'm sorry, Kachou!" Kai exclaimed.  "I didn't see you!"

Konoe's hardened features relaxed in a smile.  "Aa, Shinori-kun.  Don't worry.  It just missed."  He glanced over his shoulder; the arrow was embedded into the wall he stood along, perhaps a centimeter at most from his rear end.  He let out an audible sigh of relief.  "Ah . . . /just/ missed . . ."

Overcoming his close shave, Konoe stepped down into the practice room, striding across it toward Hisoka.  "Just who I was looking for," he said, coming to a stop before the young shinigami.

"Yes sir?"

"There has been a minor change in the schedule," Konoe said.  "You and Tsuzuki will not be working together for a brief period of time."

Hisoka frowned slightly.  "May I ask why?"

"Ah . . . he is being sent on assignment in the Kanto region with Tatsumi.  An investigation came up that we thought he would be useful working on."

"And I wouldn't?" Hisoka asked, feeling slightly insulted that Konoe did not seem to think him capable enough to be sent on assignment outside of his own region.

"Tatsumi and I agreed that it would be better if you were not involved."

Hisoka could not think of a response.  He was sure there was some valid reason that they did not want him working on whatever case Tsuzuki had been given, but he could not help but feel insulted that they had purposefully singled him out from anyone else.

"Don't take it personally, Kurosaki-kun," Konoe interrupted his thoughts.  He put a hand on Hisoka's shoulder as some kind of comforting gesture.  Hisoka shook him away.

"I'm not," he nearly snapped in reply.  Okay, so he was.  But Konoe didn't need to know that.  "If you'll excuse me, sir," he continued, forcing his voice to be calm and neutral, "I'll be going."

Not waiting for a word of parting from Konoe, Hisoka left the practice room.  He knew exactly where he was going.  There was only one person that would tell him exactly why he was not suitable for this investigation.  Hisoka knew that until he found out why he was not allowed to go with Tsuzuki, he would not be able to drop the matter and get on with his life.  He supposed that he might as well get it out of the way now, so that he did not have to dwell on it when Tsuzuki was gone.

Tatsumi was seated in his office, not surprisingly.  Hisoka did not bother to knock; simply strode in as though it was his office to do in.  Tatsumi looked up from the work seated before him, one eyebrow raised.

"Can I help you with something, Kurosaki-kun?" he asked amiably.

"Why are you working with Tsuzuki on whatever case he's been given in Kanto?" Hisoka asked immediately.  He did not have the tolerance for small talk, and neither did Tatsumi.  It was better to get to the point for the matter.

"Because you are not," Tatsumi answered.

Hisoka blinked.  "What kind of answer is that?"

"The correct one.  Perhaps you should ask a more specific question."

Why the hell was he toying with him like this?  True, it /was/ like Tatsumi to give very precise, to the point answers, but nothing quite as vague as that, no matter if it were the correct answer or not.

Choosing his words carefully, Hisoka asked, "Why can't I work with him on it?"

"Because of the nature of this investigation, we – that is, Tsuzuki-san, Kachou and I – thought it would be best that you not be involved."

"Well what's the investigation?"

"It is in Kamakura.  Does that tell you anything?"

When realization would strike like a ton of bricks, it was a figure of speech.  For Hisoka, it was not far from the truth.  The mere mention of Kamakura sent a wave of emotions and images washing over him, all so overpowering that he had to reach out to grip Tatsumi's desk for support as his knees began to wobble beneath him.

"Kamakura," he breathed, once he had overcome the moment.  "You're going to investigate . . . my family . . .?"

"Yes," Tatsumi answered.  "A request to investigate Kurosaki Rui came in.  Kachou agreed that it was a case that Tsuzuki-san should be sent on.  But he did not want you involved when he learned the nature of the investigation."

"But . . . wouldn't I be of /use/ on a case like that?  /I/ know them.  I could help . . ."

"You also have a troubled past where your family is concerned.  No one wants to force you to relive any of that."

Hisoka was not pacified.  True, he did have a troubled past, but he did not think of himself as a person that would fall to pieces is forced to be faced with his family.  There were more reasons beyond that, of course . . . he wanted to know /why/ his family was being investigated, for one.  For another  . . . it was for more of a personal reason that he suddenly had the desire to go.  Perhaps he could learn more about the family that had shunned him away and come to terms with what had happened.

"I want to go with you and Tsuzuki," he said, looking Tatsumi straight in the eyes, voice hardened with determination.

At length, Tatsumi asked, "Are you certain, Kurosaki-kun?"

Hisoka nodded.  "I think . . . it might be the only way I can accept everything, if I know.  Maybe there's a reason why they did what they did."

"And if there is no reason?  What will you do if the only reason is what you have always believed it to be?"

It was a kind way of saying '_What will you do if the only reason is because they hated you_?' but Hisoka appreciated that Tatsumi was delicate about broaching the topic.

And so what, if that was the only reason for why his parents had locked him away?  It had been a year since his death; he believed that he had accepted it at this point in his life.  Perhaps not come to terms with it, but he /had/ accepted.

"I'll live," he answered.

". . .very well.  I will inform Tsuzuki-san and Kachou."

Though Hisoka had been born in Kamakura in the Kanagawa Province of the Kanto region, he had never been allowed beyond Kamakura, and never far away from his home without being accompanied by a servant or his mother.  But despite it being his home, a city he had known well as a child, with Tsuzuki and Tatsumi, it seemed a place completely foreign to him.  Places he had once known, he had been to, everything, it all seemed so separate from him.  He wondered if that was for the better.

"Hisoka!"

His head snapped up to find that Tsuzuki and Tatsumi had gotten far ahead of them.  He hastened his steps to catch up with the two older shinigami.  It was even stranger, he thought, to be walking these streets when to all of these people, and those that were familiar with the Kurosaki clan, he was dead.  Not that he imagined anyone would be able to recognize him.  He had been locked away when he was seven years old.  None of these people knew what he had looked like when he was sixteen.

Tsuzuki gave a yawn and stretched out his arms above his head.  "Hey Tatsum~i, can we stop for lunch?  I'm hu~ngry."

"You're never /not/ hungry, Tsuzuki-san," Tatsumi replied.  "Wait until it is at least lunchtime."

Tsuzuki leaned over to Hisoka and grumbled in his ear, "Lunchtime to him is eight at night."

"You'll live," Hisoka replied, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket.  Though it was summertime, as autumn approached the air was beginning to turn chillier, giving justification for he and the other two older shinigami to be dressed not heavily, but warmly.

"You both understand our covers, correct?" Tatsumi asked, glancing briefly at them over his shoulder.  He had not missed Tsuzuki's insult, no matter how subtle he had tried to be.

"We're doctors, ne?" Tsuzuki asked.  He grinned down at Hisoka.  "And Hisoka is posing as your son."

Hisoka shot him a sour look; Tatsumi pursed his lips.

"Correct," he said.  "It seems the previous doctor disappeared, and so we will be posing as his replacement."

"Why do they need a doctor anyway?" Tsuzuki inquired.  "Is someone sick?"

"That much I don't know.  We'll see, I suppose."

Their path through the inner city of Kamakura took them eventually away from residential and commercial areas and closer to the coastline and few mountainous regions.  The path winded up into a heavily wooded area that Hisoka recognized almost immediately.  This was the path that would lead to his home.  It was the path that he had walked every day, when he was allowed to attend public school.  Reality of what he was about to approach was finally beginning to seep in.

The house was the same as he remembered.  Built in a classic style of Japanese architecture, three stories tall, surrounded by lush growth of trees and vegetation, standing not far from the Inamuragasaki cape and overlooking the coastline of Shichirigahama.  Hisoka remembered everything.  Nothing had changed.

Tatsumi strode forward without hesitation to ring the bell.  Hisoka unconsciously moved to stand behind Tsuzuki.  What if they recognized him?  Did they even /remember/ him?  Or would they know what he looked like, in this sixteen-year-old body?  A servant had always been the one to bring him his meals and books; he had not seen his mother and father after he was ten years of age . . .  That servant would have been fired by now, he imagined.

"Kamakura is very beautiful," Tsuzuki said conversationally as they waited for the door to be answered.  "I've never been before."

"Not everywhere is all it's cracked up to be," Hisoka replied.

Tsuzuki did not have the chance to respond.  The door was opened by a servant, a young girl dressed in a kimono that looked rather uncomfortable, as most kimonos were.  Considering the wealth of the family, it was not surprising that she was dressed in such a manner.  It was only proper.

"May I help you?" she asked, her voice almost timid.

"Ah, my name is Tatsumi Seichirou," Tatsumi said.  "I am expected by the master of the house, I believe."

"You are . . . oh!  You are the doctor!"

There was a chorus of voices behind her, all echoing her words.  Tatsumi and Tsuzuki exchanged glances.  These people seemed to be in desperate need of medical aid.

"Please, come in!" the servant said hurriedly, waving them all inside.  She bowed stiffly to them.  "I am Miya.  Thank you very much for coming.  Now Rui-sama's condition may improve."

Again, the two older shinigami exchanged glances, while Hisoka seemed to turn a shade paler than what was natural.

"Is this your assistant, sensei?" Miya asked, gesturing to Tsuzuki.

"Ah, I'm Tsuzuki Asato," Tsuzuki said, smiling broadly and offering a hand.  "The assistant.  And this is, ah . . ."  He faltered as he turned to gesture to Hisoka, who was for the most part, hidden behind him.

"Tatsumi Hibiki," Hisoka filled in quickly.

Miya smiled.  "Ah, your son, sensei?"

Tatsumi delivered a subtle kick to Tsuzuki's shin to keep him from laughing at his and Hisoka's sudden relations and nodded.  "Aa.  I would have left him home, but his mother is away visiting family, and I do not trust him to be alone."

Hisoka glared.

"I understand," Miya said, her ever-present smile not fading.  "Teenagers these days, hm?  Come this way, please, doctors.  I will introduce you to the master of the house."

The shinigami followed Miya as she began to lead them through the house.  Hisoka still remembered everything from when he was a child.  None of this he had ever seen after he was seven, as he had spent his days hidden in the cellar, but even after so many years he remembered.  It did not seem that anything had changed.

"Hey," Tsuzuki whispered, nudging him in the side and breaking him from his thoughts.  "Are you okay?"

Hisoka nodded; he /was/ fine.  His walls to block out his empathy kept him from reliving any bad memories or sensing feelings from anyone, and even as he walked through the place he had once called home, he felt perfectly at ease.  Perhaps it was because it was a place he knew so well.  Or maybe it was just because he had accepted his past.  He doubted it was the latter, but it would have been nice if it was true.

That was, until he heard the voice of his father.

"Thank you for coming, Sensei."

He looked up.  Dressed in a kimono beneath a yukata, standing before them in the frame of the study, was his father.  But he did not recognize the name.  His eyes were hidden to him, wrapped up in white gauze that prevented any of them from knowing his appearance.  His hands were bandaged as well, Hisoka realized.  And beneath his clothing, who knew . . .

This was his father.  And he didn't remember him at all.

"I am Kurosaki Nagare."

Tatsumi introduced himself and Tsuzuki, and then brought Hisoka out from his hiding place to introduce him as well, as Tatsumi Hibiki.  Hisoka felt a wave of relief wash over him; the man could not see him, and therefore, could not recognize him.  Not that he thought that he /would/ if he could see, he thought somewhat bitterly.

"Well, doctors, if you will follow me . . ."

Nagare made a vague gesture with his hand for them to join him.  He began walking the corridors, his pace slow as he sensed his way, but without an difficulty despite the lack of his eyesight.  Miya walked with him, to insure that he made it safely.  The shinigami followed obediently.

"Hazama-sensei was Rui's previous physician," he explained as they twisted through the corridors and rooms.  "He was one of the very few people that was able to help her condition, but a recent accident cost his life.  We have been looking for a successor since.  Because of the location of this mountain village, we had feared that . . . well, no matter.  Thank you again for coming, sensei."

"Nagare-sama," Tatsumi spoke up, speaking respectfully for this man was the master of a clan, "though we are Hazama-sensei's successors, we know nothing of the patient.  Are there any records of the doctor's that we may see?"

Nagare paused.  "There are no records.  They were stolen on the day of that man's death."

"Stolen?" Tatsumi repeated, surprised.  "By whom?"

". . . that is not a matter to inquire into, sensei," Nagare said softly.  "It would be better if you keep focused on your own work."

Tatsumi and Tsuzuki exchanged glances.  Something was amiss.  Hisoka sensed it as well.  There was something that Nagare was hiding from them, something about Hazama that he did not want them to know.  Perhaps the man's death had not been so accidental as Nagare seemed to want them to believe.

"Um . . . sensei," Miya spoke up timidly, "would it be possible for you to look at Danna-sama's eyes?"

"Miya," Nagare said quickly, his voice sharp and reprimanding.  The girl flinched.

"Are your eyes not well, Nagare-sama?" Tatsumi asked.

Nagare made a vague gesture with his hand.  "It is an affliction from several years past," he said, lifting his hands to his face and beginning to unwind the gauze.  Hisoka moved to stand behind Tsuzuki unknowingly.

The last piece of gauze fell away to reveal his eyes.  Narrowed, the color of yellow, and pupils slit like those of a snake, they were the oddest pair of eyes that any of the shinigami had ever seen.

"We have tried many remedies, but none seem to work," Nagare explained.  "Ah . . . your son, sensei?"

Tatsumi glanced down to Hisoka.  The younger shinigami sucked in a sharp breath; did he recognize him?

"Yes, Nagare-sama?" Tatsumi asked.

Nagare continued to look at Hisoka for a moment, then shook his head.  "I thought for a moment that I recognized him from somewhere.  But I have never seen him before.  Come, this way.  I will take you to my wife."

Tatsumi followed as Nagare and Miya began to continue on their path down the hall, but Tsuzuki remained behind.  Kneeling down, he picked up a small object in his hand, which he held up to the light to get a better look at.

"What is it?" Hisoka asked, turning to him.

"Looks like a scale," Tsuzuki said. "Like from a snake or something."

"Snakes don't shed scales.  They always shed full skins.  Come on, let's go before they notice we're gone."

Fortunately, no one seemed to have noticed them lagging behind.  They had stopped outside of a door at the far end of the corridor.  Tsuzuki thought inwardly that only things people wanted to hide away were kept in rooms at the farthest reaches of the house, but he did not comment.  He would mention it to Tatsumi later, but for now he was to be a quiet, obedient assistant and nothing else.

"Sensei . . . before I allow you to examine Rui, I have a request."

Tatsumi looked up at Nagare, an eyebrow raised.  "Yes?"

"What you see in this room . . . must not be told to anyone.  Do you understand?"

Tatsumi frowned, but nodded his head in agreement.  "Yes, Nagare-sama.  We understand."

Though Nagare did not appear to be at ease at Tatsumi's promise, there was little else he could do for the sake of his wife.  With an inward sigh, he pushed open the door and led them into the dark room beyond.

"Ow!  Tats--er, sensei, you stepped on my foot!" Tsuzuki complained.

"You should not walk around in the dark, Tsuzuki-sa—ah, Tsuzuki."

"I will strike a light," Nagare said into the darkness.

There came the sound of a match being struck and the room was illuminate in the dim glow of a candle's flame.  Tsuzuki found himself standing at the bedside of a woman.  Or a woman was what Tatsumi assumed; the figure was disheveled, unnatural.  Tsuzuki was justifiably frightened out of his mind.

"DWAA!!  MONSTER!"

Tsuzuki squeaked in terror and proceeded to latch onto Tatsumi.  The older shinigami rolled his eyes heavenward.

"Tsuzuki, let go of me."

"That is my wife, sensei," Nagare said, unfazed by Tsuzuki's disrespectful behavior.  Perhaps because he too saw what a sight his wife had become.

Hisoka could only remain silent, staring at the twisted, pale shape of a woman.  The skin was unnaturally pale and seemed to hang off from her, as though her body weight could not support the amount of it.  Dark straggles of hair covered nearly all over her hollow, sunken face.  But what was most strikingly wrong and disturbing was her stomach.  It looked swollen, but not like that of a pregnant woman.  It was almost too unnatural to be that way from pregnancy.

"I will explain elsewhere," Nagare said softly.  He blew out the candle and took them away from his wife's chambers.

They were soon seated in an attractive room, well-lit and used for serving tea.  But after having seen Rui, none of the shinigami could bring themselves to drink, much less eat anything.  Not even Tsuzuki, whose stomach grumbled at the sight of the sweet cakes Miya brought for them.

"Nagare-sama," Tatsumi began, "by looking at your wife, one might assume that she is . . ."

"Pregnant?" Nagare finished.  "Yes, according to what Hazama-sensei told me, she is."

"Why is she not in the hospital then?" Tsuzuki spoke up, scratching at the back of his head thoughtfully.

Nagare frowned.  "These are not matters that I want to be made public."

"It's just a normal pregnancy, right?  Why's it such a big deal if anyone knows?"

"A two-year pregnancy is not what I would call normal."

Tsuzuki, who had dared to take a sip of his tea, proceeded to spit it across the room.  "T-two years?!"

"Aa.  It would be shameful for our family for such rumors to be spread."

Tsuzuki frowned and set down his cup of tea.  "Still, it seems a bit harsh, even if the child is an important heir to the family with your only son being dead . . ."

Hisoka's eyes widened and he whirled on Tsuzuki.  Realizing at once what he had said, Tsuzuki's hand flew up to slap over his mouth.  Nagare's eyes narrowed.

"How did you . . ."

"A servant mentioned it," Tatsumi covered up quickly.  "Nothing more."

Nagare relaxed somewhat.  Tsuzuki breathed a sigh of relief, but at the glares Hisoka and Tatsumi had fixated on him, he vowed inwardly that it would be better to keep his mouth shut for the remainder of the day.  He might do something even more idiotic, like calling Hisoka by his true name rather than Hibiki.  He didn't want to imagine how he would be reprimanded for that one.

"What you mean to ask is why is she locked away like that, when the child she bears may be the heir to this family," Nagare clarified.

He sighed, paused, and took a long sip of his tea.

"That is also why I want no one to know of this.  The child she carries . . . is /not/ mine."


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Notes:** Another Tokyo Babylon reference.  Oops.  Little thief me.

I kept 'itadakimasu' as that, because well . . . it doesn't have a straight translation so it'd sound weird in English to say "I express my gratitude for the meal!" . . .okay, so maybe that's a little dramatic, but it does come off better in Japanese.

Also keep 'father' as 'tousama' . . . primarily because I can't think of a way in English for someone to call their father by something as respectful as tousama.  But then I generally keep terms like 'grandmother' and 'aunt' and such in Japanese.  Also, 'obasan' is used this chapter, meaning aunt.

And 'rei kan' is apparently 'spiritual sense' and one of Tatsumi's abilities.  Don't hold me to this, but I think he has the ability to sense spirits and demons and the like within a certain distance.  Or so my friend Megan tells me.

'Kagome' means 'caged girl.'  A lot of this is exact from the manga, and so is that portion of this chapter, so . . . yadda yadda yadda. ^_^;;

Another crap ending, too.  Whee! Go me. ;;

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Ten**

_Kill it. . .!_

_Nagare, kill that child!_

_He will be of no benefit to the Kurosaki family!_

"Tousama . . .

"Tousama . . .

"Where are we going, Tousama?

"Tousama . . .

"Whose grave is that?

"Tousama?"

Someone turned – slithered – looked at him paused and regarded him then smiled.

"You wish to know?

"This is . . . your grave.

"Hisoka."

Something slithered again wrapped around something on the ground a bloody head it wrapped around and swallowed whole.

"This is your death."

Someone screamed.

Hisoka woke up and screamed.  He did not realize that he was screaming until someone had gripped him by both arms and was shaking him to wake him up completely.  He blinked, at once shutting his mouth and realizing where he was.  Tsuzuki was seated on the bed with him.  They were inside of the Kurosaki household, in the rooms Nagare had given them throughout the duration of their stay.  Moonlight streamed in through the window, telling him that was no later than three or four in the morning.

"Hisoka?"

Oh, right.  And Tsuzuki was with him.  He had almost forgotten that as he was absorbing his surroundings.

"Are you okay?"

Hisoka ran a hand through his hair and sighed.  "Yeah . . . just a bad dream.  I'm okay.  Did I wake you and Tatsumi-san?"

Tsuzuki smiled slightly, lifting a hand to brush Hisoka's hair from his face.  "Tatsumi sleeps like the dead.  Don't worry about him.  But I heard you, so I came to check on you.  You sure you're okay?"

"Yeah.  Guess being here brings back more bad memories than I'd like to admit."

Not that it did.  When he was awake, he was fine.  It was when he dreamed that the past came back to haunt him, forcing him to relive the memories that he had long wanted to keep buried.

"Do you want me to stay with you?"

Hisoka could feel a faint blush rising on his cheeks at the offer.  Not trusting his voice, he only gave a brief nod as a response.  Tsuzuki, not seeming to notice his embarrassment, slipped beneath the blankets beside him.  Once Tsuzuki was adjusted and Hisoka was certain that his blush was gone, he stretched out alongside the older shinigami, facing him.

"This is why I didn't want you to come," Tsuzuki said softly, not speaking above a whisper when they were so close to one another.  "It's not that none of us didn't think you could handle it . . . we just didn't want you to have to live bad memories again."

"Oh. . . . yeah, I know.  But I really am okay."

"Really?  Or are you just telling me that so I won't worry?"

Hisoka closed his eyes, if only to escape having to look into Tsuzuki's.  "It's strange . . . even though I shouldn't feel anything for either of them, when I saw them . . . I don't know what I felt.  Pity, maybe.  I think maybe I was sad."

His hands tightened into fists quite suddenly and he opened his eyes.  "But I /shouldn't/.  They didn't give a damn about me so I shouldn't give a damn about either of them.  I should be /happy/ that they're suffering like this, just like I had to.  But . . . I can't . . . and . . ."

"It's because you're kind."

He stopped and looked up.  Tsuzuki was smiling down at him.

"You're a kind person, Hisoka.  It's not in your nature to feel pleasure when someone else is suffering, even if that person did cause you pain.  Especially not if that person is your mother or father."

"But . . ."

Hisoka sighed, not bothering to finish the sentence.  He did not know what to say.  On some level, he knew that Tsuzuki was right.  He was not sure he agreed that he was a kind person, but he /was/ a person that could feel compassion for even those that had done him wrong.  All aside from Muraki, that was.  He would never forgive Muraki for what he had done to he and Tsuzuki.

"Go to sleep, Hisoka . . . no one will hurt you as long as I'm here."

Tsuzuki had closed his eyes, nestling into the pillow he had confiscated.  Hisoka reluctantly did as he was instructed and closed his own eyes.  As he drifted away, Tsuzuki spoke a few soft words reassuringly to him.

"And if anyone does come . . . I'll chase them away."

Hisoka smiled and closed his eyes.

As long as Tsuzuki was with him, he was safe.

Morning came, its golden rays filtered in through the thin garments of the draperies and beaming down on Hisoka where he still slept, tangled up in the blankets with a pillow wrapped in his arms.  Tsuzuki had woken up long before him and had already showered and dressed in the attire the servants had laid out for him before he started to nudge Hisoka away.  The younger shinigami tried to ignore him, rolling away and mumbling some kind of plead for another five minutes, but there was only so much of Tsuzuki's insistent poking he could take.

"Okay," he groaned, voice muffled by the pillow his face was buried in.  "I'm up, I'm up!"

"Breakfast is in fifteen minutes," Tsuzuki said.  "Better get up and dressed quick."

Hisoka sighed and sat up, running a hand through his disheveled hair.  After Tsuzuki had come in to sleep beside him, he had slept quite well.  Well enough that even now all he wanted to do was sleep more.  But Tatsumi would not tolerate either of them being late.  It would be disrespectful toward their hosts, not to mention that as a rule, Tatsumi hated people that were late.  Hisoka stretched out his arms above his head to wake up fully before tossing the blankets off and climbing out of bed.

"Uh.  Tsuzuki."

"Yah?"

"I have to wear this kimono?"

Tsuzuki peeked his head out of the bathroom, a toothbrush sticking out the side of his mouth.  "Yah.  'ish only pwoper."

"Tsuzuki?"

"Yah?"

"Go spit before you talk.  Toothpaste is dribbling down your chin."

". . . oh."

Tsuzuki disappeared into the bathroom again.  Hisoka looked dubiously at the clothing that had been laid out for him.  He hated kimonos.  He understood very well that they were a part of Japanese culture, and because his family was as highly respected as they were, it was only proper that they dressed in clothing such as this, but it didn't make him hate them any less.  They were restricting to movement, and oftentimes had the most hideous patterns, and . . . well, there were probably dozens of reasons, but the point of the matter was that he hated kimonos.

But to put on a good face, he put it on, glad to find that it fit him almost perfectly and was a shade of dark blue he found tolerable.  Once he was dressed, Tsuzuki emerged from the bathroom, and Hisoka went in to quickly take care of a few necessities.  Within ten minutes, both were joining Tatsumi outside in the hall to go down to breakfast.

Miya met them and guided them downstairs to the dining hall, where they would be fortunate enough to have a meal without interruption, or members of the Kurosaki family.  It seemed that Nagare had things that he had to attend to, giving the shinigami a chance to speak about what they had already learned, as well as attempt to extract as much information as possible from Miya.

"Thank you very much," Tatsumi said politely as the young servant brought their meals to them.

"Itadakimasu!" Tsuzuki chirped, and he immediately began to dive into his food.

Tatsumi sighed, eyes rolling heavenward.  "Please excuse my assistant's behavior."

"It's okay," Miya said, smiling.  "Please enjoy yourselves."

She drifted out of the room to take care of her morning chores, leaving the shinigami alone.  Tsuzuki continued to eat quite happily, while Tatsumi and Hisoka ate more moderately and politely.

"Kurosaki-kun, perhaps you could give us an idea of what is happening here," Tatsumi said.  He paused and took a sip of his tea.  "As they are your family, after all."

"Sure they're my family," Hisoka replied, poking at the meal on his plate, "but that doesn't mean I know them.  I don't really remember my life before I was seven.  And after that point . . . well, you know the story." 

If Tatsumi had other questions, he was not able to ask Hisoka.  Miya returned at that moment to refill their glasses and see if there was anything else that they needed.

"This is quite a remarkable old mansion," he said thoughtfully as Miya poured them each another cup of tea.  "There are numerous storehouses and warehouses . . ."

"That's because the Kurosaki clan has been a distinguished family since the Kamakura period," Miya replied with a smile.  "This mansion has many cultural assets to the era, so it cannot be built over or redone."

"I see," Tatsumi mused.  "I suppose that is why there are still rooms like that prison . . . ah, excuse my rudeness."

Miya was not offended by his words.  "You were startled by the mistress, then?"

"It seemed like Nagare-sama was hiding something distasteful or pitiful."

"Do the other servants know about it?" Tsuzuki spoke up, taking his attention away from the meal before him for a moment.  Tatsumi sighed and leaned over to wipe up the grains of rice plastered to the side of his mouth.

"Ah . . . no," Miya answered slowly.  "Only I and a few other superior servants know of Rui-sama's condition.  There would be trouble if Danna-sama's relatives knew . . ."

"Is it really that big of a deal?" Tsuzuki asked, surprised.  

He knew that family traditions and honor were very important to all distinguished Japanese families, but he had never been brought up in an atmosphere of that kind, much less been around people of that nature.  It all seemed beyond excessive to him, to try so hard to hide something simply for fear of the opinions of the other family members.

"Yes, sensei, it is very important," Miya said.  "Danna-sama does this for fear of Iwao-san of the branch family."

"Is he an uncle or something?" Tatsumi questioned.

Miya shook her head.  "He is Danna-sama's elder brother by ten years.  He holds a grudge against Danna-sama for inheriting the main house.  He would do anything to take control of the Kurosaki family.  That is why we must hide Rui-sama.  If Iwao-san knew . . ."

"He would do everything in his power to become the head of the family," Tatsumi finished.

Miya nodded.  "Yes.  So please . . . do not think badly of the master."  She bowed stiffly to them.  "Please excuse me.  I have chores to attend to."

She left them without another word, perhaps fearing that she had already given away far too much information than Nagare would have wanted to be told.  Tatsumi frowned.

Lacing his fingers together and leaning forward with his chin to his hands, he asked, "What do you think, Tsuzuki-san?  About all of this . . . no matter how much trouble their may be with the succession, is it worth putting the life of someone on the line?"

"I don't really know," Tsuzuki admitted.  "But I thought all old families were like this.  They're like incarnations of pride and honor."

"It /is/ that important," Hisoka spoke up, drawing both their attention to him.  He had remained quiet throughout the duration of the meal, but found now that he had to speak.  "Traditions and honor and pride, whatever you want to call it . . . to this family, their image is everything.  Anything that threatens damaging their reputations . . . they get rid of as quickly as possible.  My mother . . . Rui is no different."

"Excuse me if I was rude," Tatsumi said apologetically.  Hisoka shrugged in response, and the older shinigami continued.  "We should investigate Hazama-sensei's room to find clues about Rui's condition . . ."

Hazama, according to what information Miya had given Tatsumi and Tsuzuki, had been the physician in charge of taking care of Rui for more than half a year before his death.  During that time, he had remained a guest of the Kurosaki family, and because his death had only occurred little more than a month prior, his room had yet to have been cleaned out by the servants.  It was there that Tatsumi led Tsuzuki and Hisoka, in hopes of dragging up some information concerning the odd happenings in the household.

For more than an hour the shinigami searched the room, coming up with nothing.  It was all perfectly organized, and as Nagare had told them, all information on Rui the doctor might have kept was gone.  There was not even a slight hint that could tell them what direction they should look in.

"Nothing," Tsuzuki said, slamming the last desk drawer closed.  He flopped down in the chair and sighed.  "Don't think we're going to be finding anything in here, Tatsumi."

"There is something," Tatsumi murmured.  "A spiritual residue, I think . . ."

"Rei kan?" Tsuzuki asked.

"Rei kan?" repeated Hisoka.  "What's that?"

Propping his feet up on the desk in front of him, Tsuzuki explained, "Rei kan is a spiritual sense.  Tatsumi has the ability to sense spirits and demons and the like up to about a mile.  Just watch."

Hisoka turned his attention to Tatsumi.  The older shinigami had his back turned to them and his eyes closed as he concentrated on the room and the inkling of spiritual energy tugging at him.  Hisoka was surprised to see that as his focus became more intense and precise, he began to move, walking in the direction that he could sense the energy coming from.  He stopped quite suddenly at the far end of the room and opened his eyes.

"A trapdoor," he announced.  He knelt down on one knee and pulled the carpet away to reveal the secret passage.  "It would have easily been overlooked, even by the Kurosaki family that knows this house . . . Tsuzuki-san, give me a hand."

Tsuzuki crossed the room to come kneel beside Tatsumi.  Together, the two shinigami lifted up the floorboards to reveal a small compartment below.  Tsuzuki summoned a ball of flame to his hand to light the area.

"Doesn't look like there's anything there . . ."

"Wait," Hisoka said.  "There's something down there.  Tatsumi-san, can you lower me down?"

Carefully, Tatsumi helped Hisoka lower himself into the crawlspace.  The young shinigami knelt down, rummaging amongst the dust and debris for a moment before finally locating what his eyes had seen from above.  He held up the slip of paper to Tatsumi, and then with Tsuzuki's help, climbed out of the small space.

"Something's written here . . ."  Tatsumi brushed away the dust plastered to the paper to reveal a few scribbled characters on its back.  "Showa era 53 . . . 1973, then?  This is quite old."

"What's on the other side?" Tsuzuki asked.  He had replaced the floorboards and dissipated his ball of flame, leaving them in the artificial light of a single lamp.

". . . a photograph," Tatsumi answered.  "A picture of Rui and someone . . . that looks just like her."

Tatsumi held the picture out to Hisoka.  The younger shinigami took it hesitantly.  It was in fact a picture of his mother, when she was very young.  Her dark hair was done up in ribbons and she was smiling cheerfully at the camera, in a way he had never seen her smile before her.  And beside her, dressed identically, hair matching hers and the smile the same, was another young woman.  Her twin.

". . . obasan . . . Kasane . . ."

"Kurosaki-kun is not telling us everything he knows."

Tsuzuki frowned and looked up from his tea to regard Tatsumi.  The other shinigami stood at the window, arms folded over his waist as he stared out into nothingness.  Hisoka had already gone to bed, claiming that he had not had a decent night of sleep.  But both Tsuzuki and Tatsumi had known it was because being here was finally beginning to wear on him.

"What makes you say that?" Tsuzuki asked.  "He told us what he knows about Kasane . . ."

"He told us that she was his mother's elder twin sister and that she drowned in the lake," Tatsumi replied.  "Don't you think it is odd, Tsuzuki-san, this time of age, that a person can still drown?  Much less without anyone noticing . . . /and/ in that lake.  You and I saw it.  It is too shallow."

"So you think it was suicide."

Tatsumi nodded, lifting a hand to push up his glasses.  "And if it was suicide, Kurosaki-kun must know why she would be driven to do such a thing."

"But Hisoka said that he doesn't remember anything before he was seven, and that's when his parents . . ."

"Tsuzuki-san, you remember when you were seven, do you not?"

Tsuzuki flinched.  He remembered.  He did not /want/ to remember, but he did.

". . . yes, Tatsumi."

"There is something he is keeping from us," Tatsumi concluded.  ". . . well, I am going to go out, Tsuzuki-san."

Tsuzuki blinked.  "Eh?  But it's almost midnight!"

Tatsumi glanced at him briefly, an inkling of a smile tugging at his lips.  "Concerned for me?"

Tsuzuki blinked wide amethyst eyes.  Then, realizing what Tatsumi was getting at, a faint blush rose up on his cheeks.  Tatsumi chuckled.

"I only want a breath of fresh air.  I won't stay out long."

Lifting his hand in a vague gesture of goodbye to Tsuzuki, Tatsumi slipped silently out of the room.

He shoved his hands within the folds of the yukata he wore and strolled down the hall, head bowed as he considered what little information they had.  It would have been a less difficult case, he imagined, if those they spoke to and interviewed would be a little more forthcoming with information.  But everyone involved with the Kurosaki family, even Hisoka, seemed to be hiding something.  There was some terrible secret this family harbored that they would do anything to prevent from being released to the public.

Outside, the moon was high in the sky and surrounded by thousands upon thousands of stars.  Here, within this mountain region, each could be seen without the restriction or air pollution or city lights.  Tatsumi breathed in deeply the scent of mountain air and continued on his path, winding through the forested areas of the mountain side, unknowingly coming closer to the lake that was not far from the Kurosaki house.

Fireflies were dancing near the water's edge.  Dozens of them, all lit up brightly for one moment, then darkened the next.  Tatsumi reached out and caught on in the palm of his hand.  They reminded him, not surprisingly, of his childhood.  He would come out of the house on nights like this and catch fireflies, enough to fill a jar or two.  But each time morning came . . .

"Mother would scold me for doing such cruel things," he murmured thoughtfully.  He shook his hand, successfully scaring the firefly it away.  It fluttered off to join the others.

Then, quite suddenly, all of the fireflies were gone.  Tatsumi frowned, taking an unconscious step backward.  But even as he moved the still lake water began to ripple and something – slithering – reached up from the depths of the water and closed a cold hand around his ankle.

"_You . . . ca . . me . . . Na . . .gare . . ._"

Using Tatsumi as leverage, the creature began to drag itself from the waters and continued to speak in the same broken, gurgling voice.  Tatsumi, too frozen with shock to do anything, could only stare as a face of a woman appeared before him.

"_Na . . . gare . . ._"

Pale arms wrapped around his legs.  The face looked up at him, adoration in its eyes.  Broken, pale, eyes wide and delusional, dark straggles of hair falling over her face . . .

"Rui-san . . .!"

_Kagome, kagome _

_When does the bird inside the cage come out? _

_At dawns and evenings _

_Who is behind _

_The crane and turtle that slipped?_

"Hisoka-chan?"

"Was your mother being harsh again?"

"Poor Hisoka-chan."

"Yeah, poor Hisoka-chan."

"Come on, let's play together!"

"What do you want to play, Hisoka-chan?"

"Kagome, kagome!"

"Okay, you're demon first then, Hisoka-chan."

"Kagome, kagome

  When does the bird inside the cage come out?

  At dawns and evenings

  Who is behind

  The crane and turtle that slipped?"

"Now guess the name of the person who's behind you, Hisoka-chan!"

"Name?"

"Right, the name.  Try and get the name right!"

". . . wait . . .who are all of you?"

_Aren't we all friends from the same village?_

_Have you forgotten?_

_How mean.  That's mean, Hisoka-chan._

"Friends . . . from the village . . .?"

"Don't you get it yet?!  My name is Hisoka!  The same as you!  Why do you have my name?  That was my name first!  I won't forgive you!  Give me back my name!  Give it back!"

"Kagome!  Kagome!"

Someone was shaking him, Hisoka realized.  The voice that was speaking was his own, speaking in riddles and words that made no sense.  As reality set in and he realized these things, he at once shut his mouth and opened his eyes.  Tsuzuki was seated on the bed, hands on his shoulders, looking at him in concern, like that night before.  He seemed relieved for some reason.

"I was afraid I wasn't going to be able to wake you up that time," he said, giving a smile, albeit it a shaky one.  "You kept mumbling in your sleep, and then you started yelling . . . I've been trying to wake you for ten minutes."

"That long . . ." Hisoka murmured.  

He lifted a hand to run through his hair, finding it damp to the touch.  The nightmare . . . what he recalled from it, it had not been that terrifying, like a child's dream of a monster coming to get them . . . but something about it had disturbed him so much that even now, he could not stop shaking.

"Yeah," Tsuzuki replied.  "Are you okay?  You're shivering."

"Cold," Hisoka lied.

Tsuzuki leaned over to the far end of the bed and picked up the blanket that had been laid across it.  Unfolding it, he wrapped it firmly around Hisoka's shoulders, in attempt to stop his shaking.

"Better?" he asked.

Hisoka nodded numbly.  "Yeah.  Sorry.  I must be getting annoying . . ."

"Naw," Tsuzuki said with a smile.  "Everybody has bad dreams every now and then.  Want to tell me what it was?"

Hisoka was quiet a moment, considering telling Tsuzuki and sharing with him his bad memories, but he eventually shook his head.  He did not think he could begin to explain what had been happening.  All he remembered was voices and a vague shape of a person, a girl, that was close to his age . . . but of that he wasn't sure, because in the dream, he seemed to have been a child . . . he just couldn't remember.

"No," he said quietly.  "I'd rather just forget about it.  Did I wake you up again?"

"Nope.  It's only about midnight.  I'm waiting up for Tatsumi.  He went out for a walk or something.  Do you want something to drink?"

Under any other circumstances, Hisoka would have been embarrassed or insulted to be waited on hand and foot.  But Tsuzuki seemed to be genuinely concerned for him, and if it made him feel better to take care of him, Hisoka would not stop him.  Slipping back down beneath the blankets, he gave a meek nod as his response.  After helping Hisoka tug up the covers around him, Tsuzuki stood and disappeared, returning a moment later with a glass of water.  Hisoka drank it down gratefully.

"I used to have nightmares when I was a kid," Tsuzuki said conversationally.  He had settled back down on the bed beside Hisoka, seated with his back to the wall the head of the bed was against, his legs stretched out alongside Hisoka.

Because Tsuzuki was being even marginally forthcoming with information about his past, Hisoka asked, "What about?"

"Lots of things," Tsuzuki said.  He shrugged slightly.  "You know, the usual things kids have nightmares about.  Bogeymen and monsters under the bed.  That kind of thing.  Sometimes about reality or things that happened to me."

Hisoka waited, to see if he would continue on that train of thought.  When he did not speak again, Hisoka prompted him to by asking, "What did you do when you had bad dreams?"

"I'd go crying like a baby to my neesan," Tsuzuki answered with a grin.  "She would always let me stay with her, or she would come and sit up with me until I fell asleep.  And if I couldn't, she would stay up all night telling me stories.  

"She shouldn't have, like I'd tell her, but she'd just tell me it was okay . . . Ruka had to work two jobs to support us, you see.  She always had to be up very early in the morning to get to one and then to the other.  That's why I would tell her she shouldn't bother with me.  But she'd just smile and say it was okay."

"You miss her, don't you?"

". . . aa.  Ruka was very important to me."

The sound of the door opening shook them both from their thoughts.

"That'll be Tatsumi," Tsuzuki said cheerfully, hopping off the bed.  

Hisoka thought for a moment to remain nestled comfortably amongst the blankets, but he eventually gave in to the nagging at the back of his mind and climbed out of bed to follow Tsuzuki.

"What happened to you?!"  
  
Tsuzuki's voice coming from the adjourning sitting room caused Hisoka to hurry into the next room.  There he found Tatsumi seated on the couch, dripping wet, with tangles of what appeared to be water weeds hanging from his clothing.  Tsuzuki had brought him a change of clothes and a towel, which he was running over his hair to dry it.

"I encountered a rather delusional creature by the lake," Tatsumi said dryly.  "A woman.  I thought for a moment that it was Rui, but . . ."

"How could you have been attacked by Rui?!" Tsuzuki exclaimed.

Tatsumi sneezed.  "I couldn't have.  Which makes me believe that it was her sister.  Kurosaki-kun, is there any tea?"

"I'll make some," Hisoka said quickly, disappearing from the room.  

He came back a few moments later, finding Tatsumi dressed in a change of clothes, a towel wrapped around his shoulders and his glasses perched on his nose.  Tsuzuki was seated beside him.  Hisoka gave each a cup of tea.

"She seemed to mistake me for Nagare," Tatsumi said, after having nearly downed his entire cup.  He gestured to his drenched garments.  "Perhaps because of the yukata."

"Do you really think it was Kasane?  And does that mean she's alive?" Tsuzuki asked.

Tatsumi shook his head.  "No.  No, she is dead.  I /can/ tell the difference between the living and the dead, after all."

"So then . . . her name must have appeared in the Kiseki, but her soul never gathered in Meifu," Tsuzuki murmured.  "That would make her in our unsolved cases file back at EnmaCho, right?"

"Right.  We will have one of the Gushoshin look into it."

"Well . . ."  Tsuzuki stood up and stretched his arms out above his head.  "Let's do that tomorrow.  We all need to get some sleep, and you need to take care not to catch a cold, Tatsum~i."

Tatsumi smiled.  "I thought you were not concerned for me, Tsuzuki-san."

"Oh . . . shush and go to bed."

"Yes, yes . . .good night, Tsuzuki-san, Kurosaki-kun."

"G'n~ight!"


	12. Chapter Twelve

**Notes:** The fireworks display actually does happen August 10 of every year in Kamakura on Yuigahama beach.  I didn't make that up, at least.  I /did/ make up that there's a festival going on too, but the fireworks display is at least fact.

^-^ As far as how close to Yuigahama beach is in relation to where the shinigami are, at the Kurosaki house, I wouldn't know . . . so I do take liberty here by saying that on Shichirigahama beach (not far from where I put the Kurosaki family's home) the fireworks display can still be seen.  So uh . . .bad me?

This chapter is also really quite brief . . . but try as I did, I couldn't get it any longer than this, having accomplished everything I needed to /do/ with this one.  So yah. o.o That's what you get.  Gomen ne.

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Eleven**

"Eh?  Fireworks display?"

Tsuzuki was stretched out on one of the many couches in the sitting room of their apartments in the Kurosaki house, hands laced behind his head and looking up at Tatsumi who was leaned over him.  Hisoka was seated at the opposite end of the room, curled up in a chair with a book in his arms.  His cheek was leaned casually against his fist as he listened to Tatsumi.

"We have been invited to attend by Nagare," Tatsumi said.  "It would be rude for us to not attend."

"Nagare will not be going, will he?" Hisoka spoke up.

Tatsumi frowned.  "I do not believe so.  Miya-san said that he has some business to attend to, someone to speak to or something, but he would like for us to go and enjoy a night off."

"Well, I'm all for it!" Tsuzuki said cheerfully.

Tatsumi fixated a look on him that told Tsuzuki it was not going to be quite the evening he was expecting it to be.  "We are not going to have a day off, Tsuzuki-san.  We are going to try and gather as much information regarding the Kurosaki family as possible.  Now get dressed and meet me downstairs."

Tsuzuki waited until Tatsumi was out the door to let out the dismal sigh he had been holding in.  "That Tatsumi . . . he doesn't know how to have any fun at all.  Ne, ne, Hisoka!  Have you ever been to this fireworks display?"

"I think my mother took me once.  I could be wrong."

Hisoka stood up and disappeared into his room to change.  He had not wanted to go into details about it with Tsuzuki, but he could recall having gone to the annual Kamakura fireworks display when he was younger.  He might have been six or five; he wasn't sure when exactly it was.  But he did remember the sounds of the fireworks going off, the sight of them in the sky, and the feel of his mother's hand holding his own.  It was one of his few happier memories of childhood.

Slipping out of his jeans and t-shirt, he thought of how often he had thought when trapped in that cellar that it was his fault that his parents had tossed him away.  If he had only had the sense of mind to not say anything, to not tell his mother that he knew what people thought and felt, they would have loved him the way he remembered them loving him.  That was all he had ever wanted from them.  That was all he had wanted even as the weeks in the cellar turned to months and the months turned to years.  Just to be loved and accepted.

Maybe, he thought, pulling his yukata over his head, it was better that life had happened the way it did.  After all, if his parents had not locked him in the cellar, only allowing him out at night, he would have never been outside when Muraki saw him.  And if Muraki never saw him, he would have never died.  And if he had never died, he would have met Tsuzuki.  So maybe, somehow, some good had come of the entire thing.  He simply thought that the good could not yet balance out the bad.

"Hisoka!  Are you ready?!"

Quickly fastening the sash around his waist, Hisoka hurried out to where Tsuzuki was waiting for him.  The older shinigami was already dressed in his own yukata and ready to go.  Together, they both went downstairs to join Tatsumi in the front hall, where he was waiting for them with Miya.

"You all look wonderful," she complimented with a wide smile.  "Well, let's get down to Shichirigahama."

The walk was not a long one, but none of the shinigami would have minded if it had lasted longer.  It was pleasant to walk through the mountainous paths as the sunset beyond the ocean.  Admiring the view, no one said much until they reached the beach, as each was soaking it all up in their own way.

But once they arrived at the beach, Tsuzuki became animated and full of life.  He spent all of two minutes with Tatsumi and Miya before taking Hisoka by the arm and dragging him off to try out a few of the game booths set up along the beach.  Tatsumi shook his head mournfully.

"He may look like an adult, but he's as reckless as a child," he commented to Miya.  "Please excuse his rudeness."  
  
Miya laughed.  "Oh, it's quite all right.  As long as they enjoy themselves."

Together Tatsumi and Miya walked along the beach, occasionally being stopped by people she knew from the village that wished to have a word with her.  Eventually Tsuzuki and Hisoka joined them again, Tsuzuki with various treats he had picked up around the booths occupying his attention.  Hisoka was enjoying a modest cone of ice cream.

"Ah, SonChou-sama!" Miya said suddenly.  She waved a hand in the air to catch the attention of an elderly man that was not far from she and the shinigami.  He turned, caught sight of them, and broke into a smile before striding over to join them.

"Good evening, Miya-chan," the elderly man said.  "Are you and your companions enjoying yourselves?"

"Very much," Miya answered.  "SonChou-sama, allow me to introduce the mistress's new doctor, Tatsumi Seichirou.  This is his son, Tatsumi Hibiki, and his assistant, Tsuzuki Asato."

The man's demeanor changed at once.  While at one moment her had been cheerful, he became animated and joyful at once.  "Hazama-sensei's successors!" he exclaimed.  He reached out and began to shake both of Tsuzuki's hands.  "Thank you, thank you for coming to this rural village!  Please take good care of the master and mistress!"

Overwhelmed, Tsuzuki could only murmur, "I'm just the assistant . . ."

"Assistant or not, we are all very grateful to you!  And you, sensei!"  SonChou turned at once and treated Tatsumi with the same treatment as Tsuzuki.  "Anyone that benefits the Kurosaki family deserves a grand welcome!"

"Ah . . . sir?" Tatsumi began, but SonChou continued to speak, as though having not heard him at all.  Which Hisoka thought could very well be the case; the man seemed to be hard of hearing.

"Because the heir Hisoka-sama died so young, the Kurosaki bloodline could have ceased . . . For the sake of the village, that must be avoided at all costs!"

Tatsumi and Tsuzuki exchanged glances.

"Sir . . ." Tsuzuki started, but once again, SonChou continued without noticing him.

"I have spoken of something trivial I am afraid.  Please, please, enjoy the fireworks display and the festival.  I will be seeing you, I'm sure!"

SonChou, along with the other villages that had collected around him when he began to exclaim that Tatsumi and Tsuzuki were doctors, continued away toward the beach.  Tatsumi and Tsuzuki, if it was at all possible, appeared more confused than before.

Tatsumi turned to Miya.  "Ah, Miya-san . . . what did he just say?  For the sake of the village . . ."

"The Kurosaki family are the descendants of a hero that saved this village long ago."

"Hero?" Tsuzuki repeated.

Miya nodded.  "A long time ago in this area there was a snake monster born from a horn called Yatonokami.  Through the power of the horn, it created plagues and famine and caused much suffering to the villagers.  A sacrifice was made to it each year, in that lake near the Kurosaki estates, but the god continued to make the villagers suffer.

"But then Kurosaki Ren-sama came.  He alone stood up to Yatonokami.  Ruling over the village, becoming the leader of a band of warriors, Ren-sama stood before Yatonokami.  Their battle waged for seven days and seven nights.  On the morning of the eighth day, Ren-sama emerged the victor, having slayed Yatonokami.

"But the god cursed him and his family.  Yatonokami's curse was that all members of the Kurosaki family, even today centuries later, is that all of the family name live short lives.  Unnatural death, mysterious death, strange illness . . . all plague the Kurosaki family.  People say that Hisoka-sama died young because of the curse of Yatonokami."

She paused to take a sharp breath of air.  "Tatsumi-sensei, the curse extends to anyone and everyone connected to the Kurosaki family.  Certainly, Ren-sama was a hero that saved the village, but he committed the crime of killing a god.  The Kurosaki family is a cursed house!"

Both Tatsumi and Tsuzuki remained silent, absorbing in the tale Miya had told them.  It all seemed absurd to believe that the myth of a hero and a god could be true . . . but both had seen far stranger things happen as shinigami.  It could be the truth.  And if it was, then . . .

"Eh?  Tatsumi . .."

Tsuzuki caught the sleeve of the older shinigami.

"Where did Hisoka go?"

Yatonokami . . . 

The story of the snake god and Kurosaki Ren.  Hisoka knew it well.  

Trekking up the mountain path toward the Kurosaki estates, he recalled the story his mother had told him as a child to memory.  She had said it was because of a great warrior, who would have been one of his many great grandfathers, that their family was revered and loved by the villagers.  She had told him that it was an image, a privilege that all members of their family had to uphold.  And he too, as the future heir of their family, would have to be faced with the responsibility that came with fame and admiration.

Their image . . . their pride . . . that was all any of them had ever cared about.  Even their own family, those that they should have loved and accepted despite all of their faults, they tossed away like garbage.  Nothing could damage their images.  They would not allow it.  They would kill their own son to keep their place as the admired, the loved, the revered of the villagers.  That was all that mattered.

Why, he wondered, shoving open a rusted gate to enter the Kurosaki family graveyard, had he been such a threat to him?  Because he could sense the feelings of others?  Because he was able to know people's thoughts?  Why had they feared him so much?  Was there something so terrible they had to hide, that they feared he would learn by looking into their minds?

He wouldn't have cared.  They were his family.  They could have been murderers, thieves, rapists, and he would have loved them anyway.  Because that was the way it was /supposed/ to be.  That was how the world was /supposed/ to function.  Family was supposed to be the one thing; the most important thing.

And wasn't it to his?  Sure, it was.  Family honor and pride.  That was what was important.  Not /family/.  But family /pride/.

His eyes wandered the names of all those ancestors before him as he walked, dating as far back as the beginning of the Kamakura era, from 1185 to 1333.  For them as well, pride and honor had been everything.  Ren had emerged as a hero and for it, they had all gained.  They had all suffered as well.  Because of Ren, they were cursed by the Yatonokami.  Because of Ren, and the pride of all those that had followed him, Hisoka had never known the love of a family.  He had never had a chance.

He stopped at the end of the graveyard.  Away from all the over monuments erected to past members of the Kurosaki family, at the far end, away from all the others, there was a simple plaque embedded in the ground.  It was nothing impressive.  Made of a copper, by the looks of it.  It was beginning to tinge green at the corners.  Ivy grew over it.  And marked on it, in simple characters, none that had been painstakingly made, was his name.

They had honored him with a burial.  Some kind of burial, anyway.  But this . . . he would have rather they thrown him in the ocean before /this/ . . .

Eyes blinded with tears, he stooped down and picked up the first object his hands found.  He threw the rock with all of his strength at the grave marker.  It struck and bounced a yard away.  He did not stop.  He stooped, picked up another, and threw it as well.  He continued and continued until he had no idea what he was doing.  When Tsuzuki approached, he did not even notice.

"Why did you ever have me?!" Hisoka yelled at the grave marker.  "Why?!  I never wanted to be born to people like you!  I'm glad I'm dead!  I'm /glad/!"

He stooped to pick up another rock and found nothing.  Losing his balance, he would have crumpled to the ground, but a pair of arms wrapped around him from behind and supported him.  Hisoka struggled blindly for a moment, screaming something he could not even identify.  But finally he gave up and drooped lifelessly to the ground, Tsuzuki sinking down with him.

Tsuzuki kept his arms locked firmly around his waist.  Hisoka shifted slightly, turning his head to bury his face in the fabric of Tsuzuki's yukata, not wanting Tsuzuki to see him cry.  But Tsuzuki did not seem to mind.  He did not let him go, and as Hisoka sobbed, he rocked him back and forth in a soothing gesture, until at last Hisoka's tears began to subside.

"Don't cry," Tsuzuki whispered.  "I never want you to cry."

Hisoka caught the sob that had been threatening to escape in his throat.  "Tsuzuki . . ."

"/I'm/ happy that you were born.  I'm happy.  If you had never been born, you would have never come into my life."

Tsuzuki tightened his grip around him.  Hisoka turned slowly in the circle of his arms to face him.  He was serious.  The hardened gleam in his eyes, the way he looked at him . . . Hisoka knew that what he said was the truth.

"So don't cry anymore."

Hisoka closed his eyes.  But the tears came, unbidden, and with a choked sob, he threw himself against Tsuzuki to cry against him.  Tsuzuki put his arms around him and continued to speak in soft tones, until the last of the tears were shed and Hisoka was quiet in his arms.

"Don't cry . . . don't cry . . ."

Having woken up to find Tsuzuki sleeping in Hisoka's bed once again, wrapped protectively around the boy, Tatsumi decided to not wake them and have the moment to themselves.  Tsuzuki had not told him what had happened when he had finally come in the night before with Hisoka latched to his side, but whatever it was, Tatsumi doubted that it was any of his business.  As long as both of them were up soon and doing their jobs, he was not concerned.

The house was empty, from what it seemed as he paced the halls.  He did not know where Nagare was, as the master of the house still remained to be elusive to he and the other shinigami, and all of the servants were attending to their daily chores.  Tatsumi, being the workaholic that he was, thought to go back to his room to work on some of the paper work he had transported from EnmaCho with him, when a sound from one of the storage rooms caught his attention. 

Slipping into the room, he found it occupied only by one servant.  Miya was seated on one of the many storage boxes, apparently sorting through another.  Tatsumi stepped fully into the room, accidentally kicking a box in the process and startling her from her work.

"Sensei!  You startled me!"

"I'm sorry," Tatsumi said, genuinely meaning the apology.  "You are working so early in the morning?"

"Ah . . . well, the master asked us to sort out this room a long time ago, and all the others have gone off to attend to other things . . . so I've been left here to do it all on my own."

"Well, I shall help as well."

Miya looked up at him.  "Really?  That would be great!  Um, could you move those boxes over there for me . . ."

For the next half hour, Tatsumi did as Miya instructed him, not entirely out of kindness.  Though it was not in his nature to leave a poor girl to work this hard alone, he had a feeling that he might stumble across something that would be of use to them in their case.

In the end, it turned out he stumbled across nothing.  Something simply fell from a tall shelf and smacked him right on the head.

It was a scroll.  Frowning slightly to himself, Tatsumi began to unroll it.

"Ah, so that's where the family tree was," Miya said, looking over his shoulder at the complex chart of names and dates.

"May I look at it?" Tatsumi asked.

  
Miya shrugged.  "I think it's all right.  If it were anything important, it would be in Danna-sama's room."

Tatsumi sat down on one of the many crates in the room to examine the scroll.  It was not difficult to follow.  Each name had a date of birth beneath it, some with a death date as well.  Lines criss-crossing the page showed the relationship between the members of the family.

"Hmm . . . this is interesting," he murmured.  "Everyone's given name consists of only one character.  What is the reason for that, Miya-san?"

"Probably taking after the ancestor's Ren-sama," Miya surmised.

Tatsumi nodded.  "I see . . . ah, what's this?  There were female family heads in this line?  That is odd for a bushi lineage."

"What?"  Miya sounded surprised.  She quickly put down the box in her arms and came over to sit beside Tatsumi.  She took the scroll from him to examine it more closely.  "This family has a tradition of allowing /only/ the first born male to take over as the head of the family . . ."

"But this is a female name, is it not?  No matter how I look at it . . ."

". . . .well, I don't know.  But at least anyone whose name has master beside it is male."

"Strange," Tatsumi murmured.

"Oh!  The master's guest should be arriving soon!"

"Guest . . .?"

Miya did not answer him.  Taking Tatsumi by the arm, she dragged him out of the storage room and through the many winding corridors of the Kurosaki household.  They soon arrived outside of Nagare's personal study.  Through the screen walls, Tatsumi could make out the forms of two men, one seated, the other standing.

"Danna-sama," Miya called, to announce their presence.  "I brought the doctor as you requested."  She leaned over to Tatsumi and whispered to him, "He wanted you to meet this man."

"Come in," Nagare's voice responded.

Sliding the screen door open, Miya stepped inside of the room and bowed respectfully to Nagare and his guest.  Tatsumi followed her, and as he stepped into the room, the guest turned around to face him.  A smile curved onto his face.

"Tatsumi-san.  What a pleasure to see you again."

Tatsumi returned the pleasant smile.  "And you, sensei.  I was not aware that Nagare-sama had needs of a mad doctor."

"Ah, you are familiar with Muraki Kazutaka-san, Tatsumi-san?" Nagare interrupted.

Lifting a hand to adjust his glasses, Tatsumi turned his attention to Nagare and smiled.  "One doctor knows another, as they say."  He returned his gaze to Muraki.  "May I ask what business you have here, sensei?"

"I had heard that the Kurosaki family was in need of a doctor," Muraki answered.  "When I learned that you had been employed, I thought to leave, but Nagare-sama suggested that we work together."  The same amused, pleasant smile appeared on Muraki's face.  "What do you think, Tatsumi-san?  We both might do well working together to benefit this family."

Tatsumi returned the pleasant smile with an equal one of his own.  "If that is what Nagare-sama wishes, that is what he shall have."

_Ah, pitiful Nagare . . ._

_The crime of your ancestor continues even through to this body._

_Your father, your grandfather, his father before him, all have fallen before me._

_You would do well to join them._

_Let go.  Accept this.  Your pain will end if you surrender to me._

_Do you not want release from your hell?_

_Take revenge on those villagers that sacrificed your family._

_Those villagers that gave you up to me as my murderer to save themselves._

_Your family was a sacrifice!  And I was not destroyed!  
  
Hidden in your blood, flowing through the veins of you Kurosaki demons . . ._

_Soon.  Soon I will be resurrected._

_  
Give yourself up to me._

Tsuzuki was shaking him awake again.  Hisoka was beginning to hate his subconscious.

Opening his eyes, he found Tsuzuki seated over him, the same way he always was when he woke him from a nightmare.  Or at least Hisoka assumed it had been a nightmare.  He could not tell.  It had been happening in black and white, as his dreams always did, but something, a sense the dream gave him, told him that it was not a dream.  It seemed more like a conversation that had gone on not long ago, between two people he knew . . . but only one had been speaking.  He didn't understand.

"Are you okay?" Tsuzuki asked.

"Yeah," Hisoka answered.  "It wasn't a nightmare, I don't think."

Tsuzuki blinked.  "For not being a nightmare, you sure were tossing and turning a lot."

". . . I think that I was in someone else's dream."

Tsuzuki had already stretched out comfortably on the bed they had shared the night before.  He cocked his head to the side slightly, giving Hisoka a quizzical look.

"Can you get into other people's dreams?" he asked.

"Not on purpose," Hisoka replied.  "But I remember a few times when I was a kid seeing someone else's dream . . . I guess it's a whole part of the empath thing or something."

"Well, what was it about?"

Folding his arms over his knees, still covered up to his waist in blankets, Hisoka learned forward with his chin to his arms and sighed.  "Don't know, really.  Someone was talking . . . to my father, I think.  I think the voice said Nagare at some point . . . I don't know.  It was telling him to give in, or something."

". . . creepy."

"Yeah."  
  
Tsuzuki sat up and settled a reassuring hand on Hisoka's shoulder.  "Don't dwell on it too much.  It can't be too important.  Come on.  We better get up before Tatsumi comes back and realizes we were in bed till noon."

Hisoka climbed reluctantly from bed.  He showered and dressed quickly, in a more comfortable pairs of jeans and a t-shirt rather than one of the yukatas or kimonos that had been provided for them by the maids.  While it was proper to dress in such a manner, that did not change the fact that he hated wearing them.  There was only so much of them he could tolerate.

Tsuzuki opted to dress more casually as well, in a long-sleeved shirt and a pair of jeans.  Once they were both dressed and ready for the day ahead, the two shinigami went together downstairs, to see if they could find Tatsumi.  As it turned out, it was Miya that they ran into.

"Ah, Miya-san," Tsuzuki said, catching her attention, "do you know where Tatsumi-san is?"

"He and the doctor are with Danna-sama," Miya answered.

Tsuzuki blinked.  "Doctor?"

"Another doctor that apparently heard of our problem came this morning.  He and Tatsumi-san have agreed to work together for the time being.  You should go meet him.  He's a very nice man."

"We'll be sure to," Tsuzuki promised with a smile.  "See you later, Miya-san."

Nagare's personal chambers were at the far end of the household.  Tsuzuki, not knowing his way around the vast estates yet, could not get them there, but Hisoka remembered from his childhood and found the way easily.  They heard voices as they approached Nagare's study, one belonging to the master of the house, the other to Tatsumi.  Tsuzuki hastened his steps a bit.

He stopped short as he reached the study.  Hisoka, startled by the sudden stop, nearly ran into him, but he managed to catch his footing.  Over Tsuzuki's shoulder, he could see Nagare seated at his desk, Tatsumi standing off to the side, and then . . .

"Ah, Tsuzuki-san," Muraki said pleasantly.  "I had hoped that you would be here as well."

"You know Tatsumi-san's assistant as well, Muraki-san?" Nagare asked.

Muraki, the smile never fading, turned to Nagare and nodded.  "I know Tsuzuki-san very well.  Oh . . . and the boy as well."  

He paused, a rather thought expression overcoming him.  Hisoka tensed.  Would he tell?  Would he reveal to Nagare who he was?  But if he did . . . would Nagare even /believe/ him?

"I see," Nagare said.  "Well, then I trust you will work well together.  But for now, if you will excuse me . . ."

He did not give reason for his wishing to be alone, but respecting his wishes, the four stepped out of the study.  Miya was waiting for them outside.  She led them down to the sitting room, where tea was being served.  The four took seats around the room, the three shinigami all rather suspicious of Muraki.  But the latter only smiled and looked, in all outward appearances, as though he were enjoying himself immensely.

Tsuzuki waited until Miya left them alone to demand, "What are you doing here, Muraki?"

"Hostility again," Muraki said, sounding as though he was complaining or offended that they thought he was up to something.  "I came because it is my job to do so.  I am a doctor after all, Tsuzuki-san."

"Did you know we were here?" Hisoka demanded.

Muraki took a sip of his tea, all the while smiling in that infuriating way of his.  "I had thought that, considering the tragic circumstances of this family, the shinigami might be summoned.  It was on a careless whim that I came at all.  And it seemed luck was fortunate to me."

"/Why/ are you here?" Tsuzuki asked, making his previous question more specific.

"Because, Tsuzuki-san, you have something that belongs to me."

Tsuzuki was taken aback by this comment, that seemed to him to be completely out of the blue and absolutely absurd.  He opened his mouth, attempting to ask what it was that he had that belonged to Muraki, but found that no words would come.  Frowning, he took a sip of his own tea, while Tatsumi asked the question for him.

"What does Tsuzuki-san have that belongs to you, sensei?"

"A boy," Muraki answered.  "That beautiful young boy of yours.  Golden hair, silver eyes . . . rather difficult to mistake him for anyone else, I believe.  I think he is calling himself Shinori Kaiki."

"Kai?!" Tsuzuki exclaimed.  "What do you want with Kai?"

"I told you.  He belongs to me.  I'd like him back."

Muraki set down his cup of tea on the coffee table separating them and continued, "I knew that I recognized the boy from somewhere.  One does not easily forget a face like that.  But from where, I could not remember.  It was not until you shinigami were gone from the manor that I realized who he was and where I had seen him before.  So, I'd simply like him back."

"If you think we're just going to hand him over to you, you're crazier than I thought," Tsuzuki bit out.

"I thought that you might need a bit of an incentive.  I would be happy to take that boy above your Kaiki."  Muraki made a vague gesture of his hand toward Hisoka.  "He at least is within my grasp to take.  Neither of you would be able to stop me, as you have proved so many times in the past that you are incapable of doing."

Tsuzuki's hands tightened into fists at his sides.  He opened his mouth, to make some kind of remark in return, but stopped as Tatsumi settled a hand on his shoulder.

"We will be sure to summon Shinori-kun to join us here," he said.

"What?!" Tsuzuki and Hisoka both exclaimed at once.

"You've got to be kidding, Tatsumi!" Tsuzuki continued.

Muraki smiled.  "You are a wise man, Tatsumi-san.  When may I expect--"

He stopped.  A cry, filled with pain, echoed through the corridors and reached them in the sitting room.  The shinigami exchanged brief glances, and without a word, took off in the direction it came from.  Muraki followed at a more leisurely, no care pace.

Another cry came as the neared Nagare's personal chambers.  Tatsumi was the first to reach his study, and without any regard for the man inside, he flung open the sliding door.

Nagare was knelt down on the floor, clutching his arms around his bare body.  Without his usual yukata adorning him, they could see what it was that he kept hidden beneath his clothing and bandages.  Scales, like those of a snake, covered his body in various patches.  From his wrists to his shoulders, his chest to his back.  He looked as though he were becoming a snake.

"Close the door!" he cried.  "Close the door!  No one must see!"


	13. Chapter Thirteen

**Notes:** The end of this stage. Hope it doesn't flow too quickly or anything. O.o Unfortunately, that's how this chapter has to be. I want to wind up everything for this stage now, so it seems like a lot packed into one, but . . . mneh.

More Japanese than usual in this chapter. But I'm pretty sure most people are aware of everything I've used, so I'm not worried. ^^

Cliffhanger-ish ending, but all will be explained next chapter.

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Twelve**

Nagare was not difficult to calm down.  Once Tatsumi had closed the door and Tsuzuki had brought the man a cup of tea, he seemed to be more at ease, though he quite likely, by the looks he kept giving them, was ungrateful that they had seen him in such a state.  Tatsumi held his ground, but Tsuzuki and Hisoka looked hopelessly out of place, while Muraki stood off to the side, simply observing.

"I would like to have a few words alone with Nagare-sama," Tatsumi announced.  "If that is all right with you, Nagare-sama."

Not taking his attention away from his cup of tea, Nagare waved a hand dismissively.  Tsuzuki and Hisoka filed gratefully out of the room.  Muraki, sparing a single glance to Tatsumi, followed not far behind them.  Tatsumi did not want to leave Tsuzuki and Hisoka alone as long as Muraki was around, but unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it at the moment.  And he was sure, if push came to shove, Tsuzuki would do well to defend both himself and the younger shinigami.

"Well," Tatsumi said, turning to face Nagare, "shall we speak honestly, Nagare-san?"

"I see I was right in assuming you stayed not for my well being," Nagare commented.  "Doctor."

  
Tatsumi smiled.  "So you have seen through our disguises."

"I had my doubts in the beginning."

"Shall we talk, then?"

"I do not think I can be rid of you unless I agree.  Take a seat, Tatsumi-san."

Alone in her room, pale face dotted with perspiration, Rui turned restlessly in the prison of her bed.  Ridden with the two-year pregnancy, unable to move, see the outdoors, feel sunlight . . . she sighed.  It was a terrible existence, this that she lived now.  But perhaps it was what she deserved for sins of the past.

Something was moving through the room, she realized in a moment of startling clarity.  She turned, attempting to see through the darkness of her chambers.

"Who is it . . .?!"

A sound . . . water dropping?

"Who is over there?"

She turned.  A woman, dark hair covering her face and preventing Rui from recognizing her was at her beside.  Water dripped from the long straggles of hair.  Rui gasped and tried to move away.

"No . . . impossible . . ."

The woman smiled.

". . . oneesan . . .!"

Miya had brought them tea, and sitting across from one another at the desk, Nagare and Tatsumi both sipped gingerly at theirs, not quite tasting the liquid.  Nagare had rewrapped the bandages he wore to cover the scales on his body, and his yukata jacket was wrapped around his shoulders.

"Well, what do you wish to ask me?" Nagare began.

Tatsumi set down his cup of tea.  "I would like to know of the nature of Hazama-sensei's death.  Was it an accident?  Or did you have him killed because he discovered too many of the family secrets?"

Nagare stiffened visibly.

"One cannot admit to someone one did not do, Tatsumi-san," he responded evenly.  "Hazama-sensei's death was a terrible accident."

Tatsumi did not believe him, and from the way Nagare kept his eyes locked on his cup of tea and not the man across from him, Tatsumi rather thought that Nagare knew he did not believe him.  But for the moment, he would allow it to go.  Their purpose here was not to investigate the death of Hazama, but to conduct an investigation of the Kurosaki family.

He smiled cheerfully.  "Well, let's change the subject.  How about to a story of a ghost I have heard?  A story about a ghost that looks very much like Rui-san."

He reached within his jacket and withdrew the picture of the twins Hisoka had discovered.

"Rui-san was a twin, was she not?  No one would have noticed if that had at anytime been switched.  Hazama-sensei was around them.  He learned of the Kurosaki family's secrets, of your malady, of your wife's two-year pregnancy, of Kasane's spirit in the lake.  And so he had to be ridded of before anyone else learned of this family's secrets."

"No, I told you that's not true!"

Tatsumi removed the glasses perched on his nose and began to clean the lenses meticulously.  "One of the twins died in the lake near this house, correct?  Do not deny it.  I have already seen for myself."

"Stop."

"Rui-san's elder twin was the one that died.  She committed suicide in that lake.  Her name was Kasane, and since that time, that lake has been called the Abyss of Kasane.  

"Now, perhaps, Nagare-san, you can tell me why."

"No!  Oneesan!"

Kasane lurched forward, pale arms reaching out to Rui.  The younger sister tried to move away, but having been bed-ridden for two years, her muscles were weak and she could not move quickly enough.  The cold, dripping arms of Kasane wrapped around her in a deadly embrace.

"Forgive me, Oneesan!"

"_We were always sisters_ . . ._ always together . . . ne, Rui-chan?_"

Rui dared to look into her sister's face.  She screamed.  Her face, the pale, dripping face, had become cruel and reptilian.  A piercing yellow eye glared at her from the depths of the dark hair.

"_Isn't that so . . .Rui-chan . . ._"

The lake was beautiful.  Nestled between a forested area not far from the Kurosaki estates, it was overgrown with plant and wildlife.  It had once been a place that children played, that much Tsuzuki could see by the tire swing hanging from the limb of one tree, and the sandpit not far from it.  Hisoka was seated on a swing that dangled from another tree, while the older shinigami was on the ground, his back to the trunk of the tree, simply watching the still waters of the lake.  

And the fact that they had been able to ditch Muraki made it all the sweeter.

It was peaceful here, Tsuzuki reflected.  If his parents had not been the way they were, Tsuzuki thought it would have been a wonderful place for Hisoka to grow up.

"Tsuzuki . . ."

Tsuzuki looked up.  Hisoka had his head bowed, preventing him from seeing the younger shinigami's face, but he could tell from the tone of his voice that something was bothering him.  Hisoka was naturally serious, but it was not like him to sound as though death had tapped him on the shoulder.

"I lied, Tsuzuki," he said softly.  "I lied.  I remember . . . everything about my childhood."

Tsuzuki was quiet a moment, absorbing this information.  Tatsumi had been right about Hisoka withholding information from him.  In a way, he had known Tatsumi was right, but he had wanted to believe that Hisoka would tell him the truth.  But that he had not did not bother him.  There were some things everyone wanted to keep secret.

"Do you want to tell me the truth?" he asked slowly.

". . .yeah."

When Hisoka did not continue, Tsuzuki moved away from his position against the trunk of the tree and came over to sit near him.  Settling one hand on Hisoka's knee, he looked up at him, waiting for him to continue.

"The rule . . ."  Hisoka stopped, faltered, drew a breath, and tried to continue.  "The rule of the Kurosaki family is that the first born child is the one that becomes the master of the house, and only the first born child.  But along with that rule, there is the one that states that the master can only be male."

Tsuzuki frowned.  "I don't understand."

"If a girl was born, she would be labeled as the heir of the family.  That's true, because she would have been the one that was born first.  But the master and mistress would continue to try for another child.  For a boy.  And when a boy was born, the girl child . . . would be killed.

"My father . . . though he was married to my mother, he had not been faithful to her.  My aunt . . . Kasane became pregnant with his child.  She had a girl and they named her Hisoka.  But then I was born.  My father knew that he had to have her killed, but Kasane . . . she begged and pleaded with him, and he agreed to let her live.  But so that the family would never known that he had been unfaithful to Rui, and that the girl was really his eldest child, they named me Hisoka as well, and pretended that I was the eldest.  The family believed it, so they were safe . . .

"But as we got older, Tousama . . . Nagare . . . he realized that one day, someone would discover what he was hiding.  He had to get rid of her.  So . . . when we were very young, when I was only five or six, he had her killed.

"I remember that it drove Kasane out of her mind . . . she completely lost control of her own senses.  Losing her daughter . . . it upset her so much that she committed suicide in the lake – this lake.  But before she died, she cursed my father.  She said that she would haunt him until the day he died for the wrong he had done to her, and she said that her curse would be worse than Yatonokami's . ..

"That's why . . . this lake . . . Kasane still haunts . . ."

Tsuzuki lifted his hand to gently cup Hisoka's face in his palm.  "Hisoka . . ."

"All of my dreams," Hisoka continued, not recognizing the tender touch, "are about her.  My older sister, Kasane's daughter . . . that's what I've been dreaming about . . . her death . . . it wasn't even quick or painless . . . her head . . . the head . . . and Tousama, he took me to her grave, and he showed me, and a snake was . . . was wrapped around her head . . ."

"Hisoka," Tsuzuki tried again.  "Stop."

"Kagome.  She would always play Kagome with the other village kids . . . she got along with them, she was accepted by them so they'd play with her and they'd always play Kagome . . ."

Tsuzuki gripped Hisoka by the shoulders, and in one quick movement, had pulled him down from the swing and into his arms.  Hisoka did not struggle against him.  He fell limp, burying his face into Tsuzuki's chest and accepting the comfort gratefully.

How long they remained that way Tsuzuki did not know.  But the moment ended with the high, blood-curdling scream of a woman echoed from the house and reached them.  Tsuzuki knew at once who it was.

". . . Rui."

The scream reached Tatsumi and Nagare as well.  Tatsumi stood at once.

"Rui-san, is it?  Has something happened?  I shall call the doctor . . ."

Nagare reached out and caught him by the arm in one blindingly quick movement.  Tatsumi stopped, turning to look at the man with slightly wide eyes.

"That would be useless," Nagare said calmly.  "She is delusional."

". . . delusional?"

Nagare bowed his head, turning away from Tatsumi.  "Yes . . . Rui is convinced that the spirit of her dead sister is coming to kill her . . ."

Tatsumi jerked away from his grip.

"Even now, you will do nothing to help her?  You will not admit her to a hospital so that she may receive treatment?!  For her own well-being, you must not be so stubborn!"

Nagare would not look at him.  Fists clenched in his lap, leaning forward with his head bowed, he would not meet Tatsumi's eyes.

"This is no concern of yours . . . I will say it only once more!  Stop looking into our family business!"

"Is that it?  Are you traditions so important that you would let her die?  Are they so important that you would watch your own son die?!"

It was not a question that demanded a response.  Without waiting for a reaction or a word from Nagare, Tatsumi turned and walked out on him, slamming the door shut on his way.

He nearly slammed into Tsuzuki and Hisoka coming from the opposite direction on his way out of the study.  Fortunately, he was able to catch Tsuzuki by the shoulders before they met in a collision.

"Did you hear Rui screaming?" Tsuzuki asked.

"You as well, then," Tatsumi murmured.  "Come, we must see what it is happening."

Tsuzuki and Hisoka wasted no time in following Tatsumi as the older shinigami led the way through the household toward Rui's chambers.  As they drew nearer, they could hear the dull sobs of the woman, joined with a few occasional words that meant nothing to them, but she did not scream again.  She did not seem to be in any trouble at all, Tatsumi might have thought for a moment.

The door was locked when they arrived.  But in one swift movement, Tatsumi had kicked it down, and together, the three shinigami pressed into the room.

Rui was prostrate on the floor beside her bed.  No one was in the room.  It was only Rui, huddled in a fetal position, sobbing and mumbling nonsensical words.

Tatsumi helped her back into bed.  Though he was no doctor, he did a brief examination, and found that nothing appeared to be outwardly wrong.  As a precaution, he summoned for Miya, and told her to bring Muraki for a completely examination.  His duty complete, Tatsumi took Tsuzuki and Hisoka and returned to their own quarters.

Once they were all settled in, somewhat relaxed after the events of the morning, Tsuzuki was able to convince Hisoka to tell Tatsumi the story that the younger shinigami had told him at the lake side.  Tatsumi listened without interrupting, and when it was all done, he simply nodded slightly to himself, as though it was what he had expected all along.

"So our case unravels more," he mused thoughtfully.

"Oi, he's going to get all mystic on us," Tsuzuki muttered to Hisoka.

Tatsumi did not continue on that train of thought.  He turned, and said quite suddenly, "We have to bring Shinori-kun here."

Tsuzuki nearly fell out of his chair.  "Tatsumi . . . you /couldn't/ have been serious when you told Muraki that you would bring Kai here."

Tatsumi raised an eyebrow.  "Why could I not have been serious?"

"It's . . . it's Kai!  He's our friend!  We can't turn him over to that bastard!"

"I said nothing about handing him over to Muraki."

". . . . . okay, I give up.  You're being /way/ too weird today even for me."

"Muraki's presence here makes our investigation needlessly inconvenient," Tatsumi said.  "To keep him from making our stay anymore inconvenient than he already has, we must use Shinori-kun as . . . blackmail of sorts, I suppose."

"Blackmail?" Tsuzuki repeated.  "You're going to use Kai like a tool?"

Tatsumi sighed.  "Tsuzuki-san, would you rather that we /pretend/ that we will hand Shinori-kun over to him, or would you prefer that we let him take Kurosaki-kun?"

Tsuzuki did not respond.

"I know that it may seem harsh, but it is the only edge we have against Muraki for the time being," Tatsumi continued.  "If we can keep him from doing anything to inhibit our investigation, that is what we must do.  The case will be closed soon.  We will never have to hand Shinori-kun over to him."

"You're leaving out the fine details of how are we going to stop him from snatching /Kai/ once he's here," Tsuzuki argued.  "If Muraki wants something, he's going to take it.  It's not like we can tell him 'sorry, you can't have him yet.'"

"Of course not," Tatsumi responded, sounding vaguely insulted.  "But Muraki, villain that he may be, is a gentleman.  If we convince him that Shinori-kun is in some way necessary to solving this case, he may agree to let him stay with us until then."

"You're doing a lot of guessing and hoping here, Tatsumi.  And it's going to be Kai that suffers if you're wrong."

Without another word, Tsuzuki stood and walked out of the room.

Watari was no more eager than Tsuzuki to bring Kaiki to Kamakura, but when it came as a direct order from Konoe for him to go to Kamakura with his young partner, he could no longer argue their decision.  Kai was not told why they were needed in Kamakura, and so when he and Watari arrived, greeted by Tatsumi and Hisoka -- Tsuzuki was missing -- he was none the wiser about the danger he was stepping into.  But Watari did not intend to leave him in the cold for long.

As Tatsumi was explaining what they already knew and assumed was happening at the Kurosaki household, Watari took a paused moment to interrupt, "So why don't you tell us why we're here, Tatsumi?"

Tatsumi and Hisoka exchanged glances.  Kai, not being in the least dense, knew at once that there was something they were all keeping from him.

"What's going on . . .?" he asked slowly.

Tatsumi favored Watari with another sour look before turning his attention to Kai.  "An unwanted visitor has inhibited our progress a bit."

"Who?" Kai asked, afraid he already knew the answer.

"Muraki," Hisoka replied quietly.  "He came . . . asking for you . . ."

Kai stopped short, causing Watari, who was walking behind him, to run into him.

"You're going to turn me over to him?" Kai asked shakily.

"No, we're not turning you over to him," Tatsumi answered.  "But we at least want him to believe that we will cooperate with him, so that he will not make our investigation difficult.  It won't be for long.  We're nearly done here."

"Besides," Watari said, trying to sound cheerful, "Muraki's too much of a perfectionist to snatch you up and take off.  It'd make him seem suspicious to these people here, since he has agreed to stay on as a doctor."

"Where is he, anyway?" Hisoka asked.  "We're supposed to be keeping an eye on him."

"Examining Rui," Tatsumi answered.  "Come.  We shall have a talk with him."

Muraki was indeed examining Rui.  In the brief time he had come to the Kurosaki household, he had manipulated her in the same way as he had so many others, gaining her trust in him to make her a useful piece to his game.  After all, who was more trustworthy than the doctor?

Seated at her bedside, Muraki listened with feigned interest as she explained to him in great detail how cruelly her husband treated her and how terrible it was to be locked in her prison-like room.  In truth, he was not interested until she mentioned the name of her sister, Kasane.

"Your elder twin, mistress?" he interrupted politely.

Rui turned to look at him, appearing vaguely startled that he only now wished to speak.  "Yes," she said, "my elder twin is . . . she is trying to kill me.  I'm most certain of that."

"I thought that your sister was dead," Muraki said gently.  Gently because it was quite likely, considering her circumstances, that this woman was far beyond sanity, and he did not particularly want or need her to start screaming like a lunatic.  That would bring Tatsumi straight to him, and while he was an amusing man, Muraki did not like him very much.  He made things difficult.

"Her ghost is trying to kill me," Rui clarified.  "Only yesterday morning she was here!  She fled when Tatsumi-san came . . . and then you, sensei."

"I see . . ." Muraki murmured.  He looked up with a sudden smile on his face a moment later.  "Well, mistress, it is late.  Please get some rest."

"Ah . . . yes, sensei."

Muraki paused at the door, looking over his shoulder to offer a pleasant, "Sleep well," before slipping outside.

He was met most promptly by Tatsumi and the brat.

"Tatsumi-san," he said, plastering a smile to his face.  "Oh . . ."  His line of sight went over the shinigami's shoulder to see that he and the boy were not alone.  Another two shinigami had joined them, one Muraki could have cared less, but the golden haired, silver eyed boy caught his attention quite quickly.

"You brought him to me," he continued in a pleased tone.  "I did not think you would do it, Tatsumi-san."

"We brought him," Tatsumi agreed, "but you are not to have him just yet, sensei."

Muraki raised an eyebrow.  "Must I wait?"

"Wouldn't it be a tad suspicious, sensei, if you were to take off tomorrow morning, just as you have gained Rui-san's trust?" Tatsumi asked cordially.  "I suggest that you stay well into that woman can do without you.  Otherwise you may attract unwanted attention.  Besides . . . we need Shinori-kun to assist us in closing this case."

"Shinori?" Muraki repeated, disregarding everything else Tatsumi had told him within the blink of an eye.  "Is that what you are calling yourself?"

Kai, not understanding the question, could only stare back at him.

"Well . . ."  Muraki took a step forward, nearer to Kai.  Watari immediately moved to interject himself between him, but Tatsumi caught him by the arm and held him.

Muraki lifted a hand to lightly touch Kai's face.  His fingers traced down, to his pale neck, and his index finger dipped into the collar of the shirt he wore.  He tugged down the shirt enough to reveal Kai's collarbone.

"I was correct," Muraki said, smiling.  "You are the one I have been looking for."

Muraki released Kai without a word to him.

"Very well, Tatsumi-san," he said.  "I shall wait until this case is complete.  But do well to remember that I am not a patient man."  He raised a hand in a parting gesture.  "Well . . . ja ne."

_no . . ._

_stop . . ._

_don't . . ._

_oneesan . . ._

_. . . wake up._

_kill the one that has hurt you._

The scream woke all of the shinigami.

Tsuzuki was the first to bolt out of bed.  Finding some semblance of clothing strewn about his floor, he quickly dressed in a pair of slacks and his button-down dress shirt before racing out of his room, into the main living room that adjourned all of their rooms.  Tatsumi was awake, standing in the middle of the room, while Watari and Kai, still blurry-eyed from sleep, stood rubbing their eyes and trying to wake up.

"Where did that come from?" Tsuzuki asked.

"I'm not sure . . ." Tatsumi answered.  "Perhaps Kurosaki-kun . . . dreaming again?"

Tsuzuki did not have the chance to respond.  Another scream came, and this time, he knew that it was Hisoka.

Flinging open the door to his young partner's room, he found Hisoka sitting up in bed, now fully awake and in control of himself, but with his eyes wide and perspiration dotting his face.  Tsuzuki immediately went over to him and put his arms around him.

"Hey, it's okay," he said soothingly.  "It's okay."

"No, it's not."  Hisoka's reply was muffled against his shirt, making it impossible for Tsuzuki to hear him.  Hisoka wanted to push him away and cling to him all at the same time.  He /knew/ that something was wrong, but the dream . . . it made him want to curl up in Tsuzuki's arms like a child.

But he couldn't.  Not when he knew something was /very/ wrong.

Moving gently away from Tsuzuki, he said, "I think something has happened to my mother."

"How do you know?" Tsuzuki asked with a frown.

Hisoka gave him a bland look.

". . . oh, right.  Duh.  Well, let's go take a look around . . ."

The shinigami were dressed and assembled in the living room within a matter of moments.  Tatsumi led the way out and through the winding corridors of the Kurosaki household, still being the only one of them the most aware of their surroundings.  The others followed at a safe distance.

"Not that way," Hisoka said as Tatsumi began to take them down the hallway to Rui's chambers.  "I think . . . she's somewhere else . . ."

"Where?" Watari asked.

". . . Shichirigahama.  Yeah.  The beach."

Kai yawned.  "Guess this means we gotta go to the beach."

"Certainly," Tatsumi answered with a smile.

Though Kai would have preferred not to, being as tired as he was, the shinigami agreed to go to the beach, if only to assure Hisoka nothing was happening and he was worrying for nothing.  Tsuzuki was inclined to believe that it was the nightmare that had made him believe that something was happening, but as Hisoka had been right in circumstances like these before, he would trust him.

Through the darkness, they could see nothing on the beach as they approached from the mountain to trail.  But as they drew nearer, Hisoka could make out the faint figures of people below.  Fearing he knew who it was, he took off in a run down the path.  Helpless to stop him, the other shinigami followed.

As their feet touched the beach sand, they could make out the figures of those on the beach.  One, a man, his back against the wall of a sharp uprise of cliffs, and another large, dark form that was lumbering toward him.  None of the shinigami could see clearly what exactly it /was/, but if any of them had to make a guess, they would have thought it was a serpent of some kind.

"That is Nagare," Tatsumi said.

"And he's about to get himself killed by that thing," Watari added.

Tsuzuki flashed them both a smile.  "Not for long."

He raised his hands and began to recite the incantation to summon his shikigami.  But as he drawing to a close, Hisoka suddenly lashed out and caught him by the arms, stopping him.

"That's my mother!" he exclaimed.  "It's Rui!"

Tsuzuki stopped and stared.

The creature had recognized their presence.  It turned to him, its head swerving around to pin them with its deadly eyes, and Tsuzuki saw for himself that Hisoka was not lying.  In a grotesque image, he saw that Rui was a part of the serpent creature, and its head . . . was Kasane.  It made him think at once of Mariko and what she had become at that time . . .

He could have killed Rui too in a split second if Hisoka had not stopped him.

"Sorry, Hisoka," he mumbled.

The creature Kasane and Rui had become did not focus its attention on them.  Whirling around, it focused again on its prey.  Nagare, hopeless to escape, could only stand and stare as the serpent approached to make its kill.

"We have to stop it," Watari said, sounding impossibly calm despite the nature of their situation.

"You'll kill my mother!" Hisoka cried.

"And she's gonna kill him," Watari argued, pointing at Nagare.

"Actually," Tatsumi interrupted, "I believe Kasane is the one in control . . ."

The creature lunged.  Nagare screamed.  Its teeth had sunk into his arm.  Tsuzuki took a step forward, perhaps thinking that he could do something, anything, but he did not go far.  Knowing that he would have to harm Rui to save Nagare was not something he could do.

No one saw the killing blow.  Too disgusted to watch, the shinigami looked away, hearing only the sound of bones cracking and blood splashing against the beach sand.

And then there was another sound.  Something scraping on the sound, something growling, something enormous . . .

Hisoka opened his eyes.

It was a hydra.

"No," Tsuzuki breathed.

Muraki lifted a hand and snapped his fingers.  Obeying at once his command, the hydra lashed forward at the serpent that Kasane and Rui had become.  The serpent moved away to escape it, but the hydra came forward again, until they were trapped in a pathetic game of dancing back and forth, one trading blows and the other crying in pain.

Hisoka fell to his knees, hands buried into his hair.  He could feel it.  He could feel /everything/.  Rui and Kasane . . . screaming . . . their pain . . . everything.

"Stop it . . . stop . . ."

"Hisoka!"

Tsuzuki was by his side, daring not to touch him, for some fear of hurting him.

"Do something," Hisoka choked out.  "Stop that thing . . ."

Tsuzuki stood.  Giving a single nod acknowledgement, he raised his hands and began the incantation to summon his shikigami.

Suzaku appeared before him in flames.  She needed no encouragement.  Knowing exactly what it was expected of her to do, she moved forward and interjected herself between the hydra and the serpent.  Distracted, the hydra dedicated its rage to her, and tearing his attention away from Suzaku for a brief moment, Tsuzuki saw the serpent crash into the ground.  Watari and Tatsumi both hurried over to see what they could do, if anything.  Kai remained with Hisoka.

The hydra and phoenix traded blows for an indeterminable amount of time.  Tsuzuki realized that he was bleeding half-way through; he had been gnawing so much on his lip from worry for his shikigami he had broken the skin.

Muraki, on the other hand, was beginning to tire of this play.  While his hydra was stronger than Suzaku and could have easily defeated her, she was an intelligent creature, and did well to protect both herself and her master.  Muraki realized that something would have to be done to end this quickly.

He snapped his fingers, wordlessly giving the hydra a new command.  It moved forward, and Tsuzuki saw too late where its destination was.  He could do nothing to stop it before it had overtaken both Hisoka and Kai on the ground.  The flames radiating from Suzaku made it impossible for him to see what was happening.

"Neechan!" he yelled to her.  "Pull back!!"

Suzaku did as she was instructed, moving to hover behind him protectively.  Tsuzuki saw then that the hydra held Hisoka in one of its deadly claws, and Kai was in the other.  Both struggled to escape, but neither could break the grip.

"Make a decision, Tsuzuki-san," Muraki called.  "I created all of this to end your case quickly so that I could take the boy, but of course you shinigami had to make it more difficult for me.  Now decide whether I take the boy as we agreed, or if I kill them both."

"No!" Tsuzuki cried.

"It is a simple question.  Which do you want to live?"

"That's not simple at all!" Tsuzuki yelled at him.  "I can't do that!"

Muraki raised an eyebrow.  "I suggest that you do.  Like myself, my hydra is not well known for his patience."

To add to his words, a low growl escaped the hydra's throat.  Both Hisoka and Kai cried out as it tightened its grip around them.

"It wasn't . . . supposed to work like this," Tsuzuki whispered.  "Tatsumi, you said it'd be okay . . ."

"Tsuzuki-san," Muraki pressured.

"_Shut up_!" Tsuzuki screamed.  "_Shut the hell up_!"

". . . very well.  The decision is mine."

Tsuzuki screamed for him to stop.  Muraki snapped his fingers.  The hydra carelessly discarded Hisoka -- by throwing his body into the sharp, rigid cliffs surrounding the beach.  As he fell limp to the ground, the hydra turned, carrying its prize to its master.

"Hisoka!"

Tsuzuki was not long in reaching his partner.  Falling to his knees beside him, he gathered the near lifeless form into his arms.  Broken, bleeding, Hisoka did not respond to any of his attempts to wake him.

"Hisoka, wake up!  Open your eyes!  Please!"

He did not see Muraki gather the unconscious Kaiki into his arms.  He did not seem him fade away, Kai with him.  He saw only Hisoka and heard only the sound of his own voice begging him to wake.

"Hisoka . . . please . . . please, Hisoka, come on . . . open your eyes . . ."


	14. Chapter Fourteen

**Notes:** Ugh. This took bloody forever. Sorry, people.  There's really no excuse for it this time.

However, there are infinite amounts of Tsuzuki/Hisoka goodness.  Actually, not quite, but when they are together, it's ridiculously adorable.  So hopefully that makes up for my tardiness.

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Thirteen**

"Kurosaki-kun is fortunate that he has the regeneration abilities of a shinigami, or else I do not think he would have survived.  Both his legs are broken, however, and while he will heal more quickly than a normal person would, he will still be out of commission for at least another two weeks."

Fingers steepled before him, Konoe listened quietly as Tatsumi explained all that had happened throughout the course of their case in Kamakura.  It was a week since the incident, and because he had seen the toll it had taken on all of them, Konoe had not requested a report immediately.  Only now had he asked Tatsumi to tell him everything.

"And the case," he said slowly, "what of that?"

"No one is quite sure what happened," Tatsumi admitted.  "I at least have a vague idea."

Konoe gestured for him to continue.

"Well . . . I believe that it was the curse of Yatonokami that caused Kurosaki Rui to be bed-ridden with a two-year pregnancy.  It was by that same curse that Nagare had the skin disease that he did.  Yatonokami was attempting to . . . possess him it seemed.

"However, I believe that Yatonokami lost its physical form when Kurosaki Ren destroyed it all those years ago, and its blood remained dormant in the blood of the Kurosaki family.  It was possessing Nagare, but as Nagare resisted, it had to go to someone else . . . and that was Kasane.

"Yatonokami must have taken complete control of Kasane at some point and using her, was able to get to Rui and become the physical form of a serpent that we saw on Shichirigahama that killed Nagare.  And Muraki played only a small piece in it all.  Using the family's curses, he caused all that happened that night, so that he could sabotage our case and take Shinori-kun.  He is, after all, not a patient man."

Konoe was silent as he absorbed all of the information.  Finally, he gave a brief nod of his head.

"Very well.  What became of Rui and Kasane?"

"Kasane has finally moved on and gone to Meifu.  Rui survived, and from our follow-up inspection, we found that her two-year long pregnancy has ended, and she gave birth to twins.  Those children at least will not grow up with the curse of Yatonokami."

"And the Kurosaki household itself?"

"Rui has become the head.  It seems they will be doing things a little more modernly from now on."

Konoe nodded.  "I see.  As for Shinori-kun . . ."

"A rescue operation is in order.  Who shall I send?"

Konoe's hands came up to his temples to massage them in hopes of alleviating the headache he was developing.  There was certainly no shortage of shinigami to send, but with both Hisoka and Kaiki out of commission, it made it somewhat more difficult for him to choose who would go.  Particularly when each pair of shinigami had their own affairs in their districts to take care of on top of everything else . . .

"Considering it is Muraki, I do not want to send just one shinigami," he said slowly.  "Perhaps Terazuma and Wakaba?"

Tatsumi pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose.  "While both are capable, they should not be sent alone against that man.  Perhaps sending Tsuzuki-san and Watari-san with them would be a good idea."

Konoe waved a hand vaguely.  "Yes, that's fine . . . go ahead and give the order, Tatsumi."

After giving a brief nod of acknowledgement, Tatsumi slipped out of the office.  He sighed softly and started down the hall.

The workroom was empty when he entered, which meant that everyone on duty was likely in the infirmary visiting Hisoka.  Tatsumi headed in that direction, and certain enough, he found Watari, Terazuma, and Wakaba all in Hisoka's room to keep him company.  Tsuzuki was no where to be seen.

"Hi Tatsumi-san!" Wakaba said cheerfully, noticing his presence before the others.  Tatsumi smiled in return.

"Good morning," he said politely.  "But I do come bearing bad news."

Watari looked up sharply at him from the most recent of his inventions he was tinkering with.  "What bad news?" he asked, fearing it had something to do with Kai.

"You three are being sent on assignment along with Tsuzuki-san," Tatsumi said.

"Assignment?" Terazuma repeated.

Tatsumi nodded.  "To retrieve Shinori-kun."

"Tatsumi, don't come into a room saying you've got bad news when it's /not/ bad news," Watari said irritably.

Tatsumi smiled slightly.  "My apologies.  How are you feeling, Kurosaki-kun?"

Hisoka turned his gaze away from the window he had been staring out of, looking vaguely startled at being spoken to.  "Huh?  Oh.  I'm okay."

Tatsumi frowned.

"Would it be all right if all of you if I speak to Kurosaki-kun alone for a moment?" he asked, glancing around the room.

Watari, Wakaba, and Terazuma all filed out of the room without debate.  They knew as well as Tatsumi did what was wrong with Hisoka, and they also knew that Tatsumi was the only one that could talk to him.

Taking a seat at Hisoka's bedside, Tatsumi wasted no time in asking, "Tsuzuki-san has not been to see you, has he?"

Hisoka looked for a moment as though he would argue or claim that was not what was bothering him, but it was short-lived.  If anyone could see straight through him, it was Tatsumi.

"It's been a week," he said quietly.

"Tsuzuki-san is understandably upset about what happened in Kamakura," Tatsumi replied calmly, rationally.  "He takes the blame for your injuries and Shinori-kun's abduction."

"But it's /not/ his fault!" Hisoka exclaimed.

"No.  But as long as he believes it was, it will be that way for him.  None of us can force him to think differently."

"Still . . ."

"I will speak to him, if you wish.  I have to inform him of his upcoming assignment anyway."

Hisoka looked at him sharply.  "No."

"No?" Tatsumi repeated, raising an eyebrow.

"I don't want to seem anymore pathetic that I'm already being."

Tatsumi stared at him for a moment, then broke into a soft chuckle.  "I will speak to Tsuzuki-san."

While Tsuzuki had been avoiding the others, particularly Hisoka, he could not avoid having to report in to work every morning.  For that reason, Tatsumi knew that he could not be far.  And if he knew Tsuzuki correctly, not far meant that he would be outside of EnmaCho brooding beneath the sakura trees.

Which turned out to be the exact truth, not surprisingly.  Tatsumi smiled a brief, private smile, shook his head, and walked over to him.

"You'll catch a cold," he said lightly.

Broken from his thoughtless gazing, Tsuzuki startled out of his dream world and looked up at him.  He was stretched out beneath one of the trees, hands tucked behind his head, suit jacket littered with white petals.  Tatsumi settled down beside him and absently brushed them away.

"This cannot be a good sign," Tatsumi said thoughtfully.  He sat with his back to the trunk of the tree, gaze turned away from Tsuzuki.  "You only come here when you have something to be upset about."

Tsuzuki closed his eyes.  "Aa," he breathed softly.

After a brief moment of silence, Tatsumi announced, "I cannot leave you like this."  He glanced sidelong at Tsuzuki.  "Perhaps a trip to Chijou for tea is in order . . . or cake."

His words gained a small reaction from Tsuzuki that he had been hoping for.  Tsuzuki looked up at him, a faintly hopeful gleam in his amethyst eyes.  Tatsumi smiled.

"Well, come on then."

By one of the many virtues of shinigami travel between Meifu and Chijou, Tatsumi and Tsuzuki arrived on Chijou within a matter of seconds.  Glancing around, Tsuzuki saw that Tatsumi had taken them into the heart of Tokyo, for whatever reason, but before he had a chance to ask the man Tatsumi had started to walk down the sidewalk.  Tsuzuki hastened to catch up to him.

Tsuzuki had never been familiar with Tokyo during his lifetime, having grown up in a small, secluded village not far from Kyoto, nor was he familiar with the vast city in his afterlife.  For that reason, he kept close to Tatsumi, who knew his way around.  This district of Japan had been his area for a time, after all.

Tatsumi brought them eventually to a small café on a street corner, where they were welcomed graciously and seated immediately.  Tsuzuki allowed his eyes to drift around the western-styled café as Tatsumi perused the menu.

"Well?" Tatsumi asked after a few moments, breaking him from his wandering.  He had set down his menu and was waiting patiently for Tsuzuki to notice him.  The younger shinigami flushed faintly.

"Sorry," he mumbled, picking up his own menu.

"It's all right," Tatsumi said with a smile.  "You have much on your mind."  
  
Tsuzuki frowned at the menu in his hands.  "Yeah . . ."

The waitress appeared to take their orders.  Tatsumi asked for tea for the both of them, while he was lenient with Tsuzuki and allowed him to order two slices of apple pie.  The younger shinigami looked considerably happy about this arrangement, but Tatsumi could see well enough that two slices of pie were not going to help him.

"You have not been to see Kurosaki-kun," Tatsumi said lightly.  He smiled politely at the waitress when she returned with their orders, then took a delicate sip of his tea.  "He has been conscious for well over a week now."

Tsuzuki kept his eyes focused on the plate before him.  He poked at one of the slices of apple pie; their appeal was quickly fading away.

"I have been," he replied quietly.  "Just . . . never when he's been awake."

"Why not?" Tatsumi asked.

Tsuzuki sighed.  "I don't know.  I just don't feel like I can face him right now."

"He does not blame you."

"I know that," Tsuzuki answered softly.

"Then why will you not see him?"

Tsuzuki looked away.  Why, indeed.  He wanted to.  When it had happened, and he had seen Hisoka, covered in blood, unconscious . . . he had thought the worse.  He had never felt more relieved when he had learned that Hisoka would be fine, once his broken legs were healed.  Still, it was hard for him, to face Hisoka and the others and know that there was something he could have done to prevent what happened.

"I don't know, Tatsumi," he said finally.  "I really don't."

"Well," Tatsumi said, in a tone that stated that he was willing to let the subject drop, "Kurosaki-kun is not the only reason I wanted to speak with you.  You are being sent on assignment with Watari-san, Terazuma-san, and Wakaba-chan."

Tsuzuki blinked up at him.  "Isn't that a bit excessive?  Sending four people on one job, I mean."

"This is not an ordinary assignment."

"Then . . ."

Tatsumi leaned back in his chair, his cup of tea brought to his lips, hiding his mouth as he spoke.  "You are being sent to retrieve Shinori-kun."

It was obviously not what Tsuzuki expected to hear, if the dumbfounded expression on his face was any indication.  It was so hopeless of a face that Tatsumi could not help but chuckle softly.

"Did you think that we were going to leave him to Muraki?" he asked.

"No!" Tsuzuki said quickly.  "I just . . . I mean, how do we know that Kai is even alive?  Well, I mean, as alive as he can be, since he's already dead and well . . . you know what I mean."  It was hard for him to say, but unfortunately, it could very well be the truth.  Muraki had the ability to kill shinigami, and Tsuzuki did not trust him to not kill Kaiki.

"Tsuzuki-san.  His name would be recorded in the Kiseki.  Have you not been sleeping well lately?"

Tsuzuki gave in to the urge and poked his tongue out at Tatsumi.  "I forgot!  I've had a lousy week, you know."

Tatsumi smiled, not in amusement, but in a sad, private way.  "I know."

"So then you know where we should start looking?" Tsuzuki asked.

"We have a vague idea," Tatsumi answered.  "Besides, Muraki has a habit of being wherever we are, so I imagine that it will not be difficult to make contact with him.  We will be sending you to Tokyo to begin with.  His practice is there, so it is the most logical place to start looking."

Tsuzuki nodded.  He was inwardly grateful that his mind had not gotten ahead of him and made him begin to worry about the assignment.  Where Muraki was concerned, he always felt helpless, but the feeling had yet to hit him.  He imagined it would creep up on him in the most inconvenient of moments, though.  Luck wasn't much on his side these days.

"Well," Tatsumi began, "we ought to get back.  You have quite a few preparations to make."

Tsuzuki sighed.  "Yeah . . ."

Terazuma and Watari took care of the few preparations they needed to make before they began their search for Muraki and Kaiki, giving Tsuzuki, rather unfortunately, plenty of time alone.  He spent the majority of it avoiding all of the pointed looks Wakaba kept sending in his direction, telling him blatantly without words to go see Hisoka.  No one seemed to understand that it was not that easy for him.

It was in the duo office that he and Hisoka shared that Tatsumi found him that evening.  The older shinigami was on his way home, always the last to leave the agency, when he noticed the office light on.  Under normal circumstances, he might have been worried about that, as he had been the last to leave for the past fifty years, but considering what strain Tsuzuki was under it was not that surprising.

He nudged the door to the office open and found Tsuzuki seated at his desk.  Or, more accurately, he was slumped over his desk and looked as though he had fallen asleep hours ago.  Tatsumi smiled slightly, simply admiring him from a distance for a moment.  When he was awake, Tsuzuki was a turmoil of feelings, that often surfaced in his expressions, but when he was asleep, it was the only time Tatsumi ever saw him with something resembling tranquility on his face.

He crossed the room and placed a hand on Tsuzuki's shoulder, giving him a gentle nudge.  "Tsuzuki-san," he said softly, "wake up.  You should have been home hours ago."

Tsuzuki made some sound vaguely like a plead for another few minutes of sleep.  With another small nudge, he woke up completely and looked around in bewilderment.  It took a moment for his eyes to focus on Tatsumi.

"Ah, Tatsumi.  What time is it?"

"Late," Tatsumi answered.  "What are you doing sleeping in your office?"

Tsuzuki shrugged and stretched out his arms above his head.  "I dunno.  I just fell asleep."

"Hm, well.  Come on.  I'll walk you home."

Tsuzuki was far too tired to disagree, and so he allowed Tatsumi to help him up and guide him out of the room without any trouble.  Once they were walking out of the building, however, and into the crisp Meifu air, all traces of sleep on his face and in his movements were gone.  He wrapped the folds of his jacket more firmly around his body in hope of warding away the cold.  Tatsumi did not feel the bite as much as Tsuzuki, and so was content with only his suit jacket.

"It looks like it may rain," Tatsumi said offhandedly, looking toward the sky.  Dark clouds were gathering, blemishing the perfection that was the Land of the Dead.

His own eyes not lifting from the ground as he walked, Tsuzuki replied, "Hope so."

"Why is that?" Tatsumi asked.  A slender eyebrow had arched over the rim of his glasses.

"Well," Tsuzuki began, only to stop short, as he considered the question for a moment.  "I suppose because when it rains here, or it snows, it makes me feel like this place really is home."

"Tsuzuki-san?"

Tsuzuki sighed, but there was a slight inkling of a smile tugging at his lips.  "People expect the afterlife to be perfect, not like life.  People expect for everything to be bright and beautiful and . . . and, well, perfect.  The way they want life to be.

"But life isn't perfect, so you accept that as you live.  And when you die, you get something better, sure, but not perfect.  Because nothing really can be, can it?  So when it rains or snows here, or the sky is gray, it reminds me that this place isn't really bliss.  It's not really Heaven.  It's just another step toward the perfection people are always looking for."

Tsuzuki paused a moment.  Tatsumi took the opportunity to look at him, a wondering expression on his face as he looked into those strangely serious amethyst eyes.  It was not like Tsuzuki to be this thoughtful.  It was almost disturbing, in a way.  Certainly, Tatsumi had always known that there was a deeper side to Tsuzuki, the opposite of what he showed on the surface, yet he would give anything to see Tsuzuki smile.  Even if it was a mirthless smile, it was far better than what his face revealed now.

"That is an interesting way to put it," Tatsumi replied.  "I always thought that it rained here because at times, it can be comforting to people."

"Maybe," Tsuzuki said, nodding his head in half-hearted agreement.

The walk to Tsuzuki's home was brief.  He lived in a well-populated area of Meifu, what would have been a replica of Tokyo, if it were only somewhat larger.  Still, despite its difference in size, the city still had many of the things that people knew Tokyo for -- the Tower, for one, or the Sunshine 60 building, or the Highrises of Shinjuku.  That was why so many spirits of the dead chose to populate here.  It was comforting to them.  It reminded them of home.

"I'll see you tomorrow then, Tatsumi," Tsuzuki said with a smile.  He was standing in the doorframe of the apartment, Tatsumi across from him in the hall.  The older shinigami nodded.

"Good night, Tsuzuki-san."

"G'night."

Tsuzuki waited until Tatsumi had disappeared around the corridor to shut the door.  With a sigh, he leaned back against it once it was closed.  He knew that Tatsumi was only concerned for him after what had happened in Kamakura, probably even still concerned after the incident in Kyoto, and he appreciated it.  But he hated to be reminded of how much he was worrying the older shinigami, and that was what Tatsumi was doing by constantly looking over him.

He knew that he should go to see Hisoka.  He felt horrible for not visiting him, but every time he thought for the briefest second that he had worked up the courage, it faded away just that quickly.  It was a mystery to him what he was so afraid of.  It was only Hisoka, after all, but still . . .  something continued to gnaw at him.

He had waited too long, he realized.  If he went now, he would have to see Hisoka upset with him – not for anything that had happened, no.  Upset with him because he had never come to see him.  Tsuzuki didn't know if he would be able to look into those conflicted eyes, misery and anger all at once, and be able to fight his own insecurities, his own fear.  

How could he help Hisoka, when he couldn't even save himself?

How could he care about someone again, after what had happened to the last person he had loved?

Hisoka deserved something better.  Hisoka deserved someone that would care for him unconditionally, someone that would be able to make room in their life for him.  Someone that would push away the past to be with him.

Tsuzuki didn't think he would ever be able to be that person.

Terazuma was seated on the steps of the Meifu Diet Building when Tsuzuki arrived at work the next morning.  The younger shinigami had a cigarette hanging out the side of his mouth, and when Tsuzuki passed him, he said nothing to his senior.  Nor did Tsuzuki give a word of greeting to him -- for once, not because they did not get along, but because Terazuma saw that Tsuzuki was troubled and did not want to bother him, and Tsuzuki did not have the energy to argue.

Tsuzuki was late, as usual, and found when he entered the building that Konoe had already given his assignment briefing.  Watari and Wakaba were taking care of a few last minute necessities, and once they were done, they would be departing for Chijou.

Tsuzuki knew that he would only be in the way, and thus disappeared into his office, intending to stay until someone came and told him they were ready to leave.  That way he could neatly avoid everyone, and maybe, if he was lucky, be able to sleep some.

He should have known that he could never be so fortunate.

No more than five minutes after he had sat down and propped his feet up on the desk, was there a very light knock at the door.  He considered ignoring it and pretending that he was not there at all, but when he did not reply for more than a minute, the door was gently nudged open and Tatsumi stepped through.  Tsuzuki felt his muscles tightening involuntarily; he had become uncomfortable Tatsumi, because of his fear that he was hurting the older shinigami.  But Tatsumi did not seem to notice.

"You will be leaving shortly," he said, almost offhandedly.  "You should say good-bye to Kurosaki-kun before you go."

Tsuzuki took a hesitant moment to reply.

"I know."

Tatsumi turned away from him, preparing to leave.  "The others will wait for you," he said.  "Take as long as you need."  And with that he disappeared from Tsuzuki's sight.

Tsuzuki sighed.  Tatsumi was right.  He had to see Hisoka before they departed.  He had no idea what would happen, given that it was Muraki that they were searching for, and he had no idea if any of them would escape unscathed.  If something did happen, he knew that he would regret it if he had never had the chance to talk to Hisoka before he . . . well, quite possibly 'died'.

There seemed to be no one around when Tsuzuki emerged from his office, not even Watari or Wakaba.  He could only assume they had gone to fetch Terazuma, who was going along with this assignment rather grudgingly, given his general opinion of Tsuzuki.  Tsuzuki made a silent vow to behave himself this time.  It would save all of them quite a bit of trouble.

He wandered down the winding halls, eventually drawing closer and closer to the infirmary than he would have liked to been.  And before he was quite aware of it himself, he had arrived.

He paused outside the door.  He had no idea what to say.  Much less did he know if Hisoka even wanted to see him, given how long he had been here without Tsuzuki coming to see him even once.

Tsuzuki drew in a deep breath and prepared himself for the cold shoulder he was bound to be given.  It was now or never.  If he left now, he knew that he would never come back.

Knocking lightly on the doorframe to announce his presence, Tsuzuki poked his head into the room with a bright smile on his face.  "Hiya Hisoka!"

Hisoka's eyes whipped around from their careful contemplation of the sakura tree outside the bedroom window.  Tsuzuki kept the false smile plastered on his face and came completely into the room, plopping down in a chair that was not far from Hisoka's bedside.

"Sorry I didn't come sooner," he said, "but Tatsumi's been keeping me reeeeeeally busy."

Hisoka raised both eyebrows.  Tsuzuki expected him to believe that lie?  Even if it was true, and Tatsumi had been keeping Tsuzuki busy, Tsuzuki was too much of a slacker to dedicate all of his time to his work.  He would have never done it all.

"I was going to bring from breakfast donuts or something, but then I remembered that you don't like sweets much, so...."  Tsuzuki trailed off hopelessly.  He didn't know how long he could keep up this face.

"Um, well, me and Wakaba-chan and Watari and Terazuma are being sent out on assignment together," he continued, searching for anything, anything at all to say.  "We probably won't be back for awhile, since it's pretty serious . . . but I guess you probably already knew that if Tatsumi told you, huh?"

"Tsuzuki."

He looked up.  Hisoka was no longer looking at him.

"Shut up."

Tsuzuki bit his lip.  "I'm sorry, Hisoka."

"You're really an idiot."  Hisoka was speaking in the same flat, indifferent tone of voice that he had always used with Tsuzuki when they had first become partners.  And his eyes never left his careful contemplation of the sakura tree.

"The entire time I was in here, you know what the one thing I wanted was?"

Tsuzuki was practically gnawing his lip raw.  "No, Hisoka . . ."

"I wanted to see you.  I wanted to be sure that you were all right, because I knew that after all that happened, you'd blame yourself and I wanted to tell you that it wasn't your fault at all.  You were only doing what you had to do.

"But you know, since you stayed away so long, it made you seem even more guilty.  So maybe it /was/ your fault."

Tsuzuki drew back, stung.  He knew that there were innumerable incidents that were blatantly his fault.  The destruction of the library, when he had been possessed by Saagantanasu, or when his and Terazuma's fighting had cause half of the newly rebuilt library to be destroyed as well.  He knew that those things were his fault, as did the other shinigami, but no one had ever come out and said to his face that it was his fault and he was to blame.

"Stupid," Hisoka said softly, looking at his pitiful face.  "I don't mean that."

Tsuzuki closed his eyes.  "It's true.  It is my fault.  It's my fault that you were hurt and Kai was abducted and Nagare was killed.  I didn't do anything to stop it, so . . . I'm the one to blame."

"Tsuzuki, dammit, sometimes there are times when someone /is/ to blame and sometimes there are times when it's just the fault of circumstance!  This is one of those times!"

Startled by the force of Hisoka's voice, Tsuzuki lifted his head and looked at him.  Hisoka now had his eyes on him, but he was angry, that much Tsuzuki could tell.  He was finding it difficult to not give in to the urge to break away from that gaze.  But he knew that it would only frustrate Hisoka more.

"I'm sorry," he whispered dully.

It was because Hisoka knew that he had hurt him that he was frustrated.  He let out an explosive sigh.

"Tsuzuki, I didn't mean it, really.  I was just upset that you never came."

"I tried to.  But I didn't know how to face you after everything that had happened.  So I only came at night when I knew that you were asleep.  It made me feel less guilty, coming at night . . . but that means I was probably just doing it for myself, not you . . ."

Tsuzuki brought up his hands to his face, so that his voice became muffled.

"I'm sorry, Hisoka.  I'm sorry I'm so selfish."

Hisoka's expression softened.  "Tsuzuki."

Gingerly, he reached out and pressed the palm of his hand against Tsuzuki's cheek, finding it warm and wet to the touch.  Tsuzuki was crying.  Hisoka sighed and gently forced him to look up from his hands.

"It's okay, Tsuzuki.  I understand."

He slipped his arms around the older shinigami's shoulders.  Tsuzuki went along willingly, and did not object when Hisoka drew him into an embrace.  He only buried his face against Hisoka's stomach and wrapped his arms around his waist.  Hisoka ran his fingers soothingly through Tsuzuki's hair, the same way Tsuzuki had done for him when they were in Kamakura.

"Please," Hisoka murmured softly.  "Please promise not to stay away anymore."

Tsuzuki nodded, and against Hisoka's stomach, his voice came out muffled.  "I promise."

Hisoka let out a breath of relieved air.  He knew that Tsuzuki was telling the truth.  As Tatsumi had once told him, Tsuzuki always said what he meant and meant what he said.  He would never lie.

"And . . . promise to stay with me."

  
Tsuzuki slowly lifted his head to look at him.  "Hisoka?"

It reminded him so well of the single request he had made to Hisoka, such a long time ago.  

'_Can I stay with you_?'

"Don't die out there," Hisoka said, trying to brush it off nonchalantly.  "Because . . . it is Muraki that you're going against, and I can't be with you, so . . . I'll worry."

Tsuzuki smiled.  With a contented sigh, he settled more comfortably into Hisoka's arms.

"I promise, Hisoka.  I'll stay with you."


	15. Chapter Fifteen

**Notes:** Reading Rurouni Kenshin stories lately, something has started to bother me.  Japanese in stories.  Some is okay.  For instance, if I'm reading Rurouni Kenshin fan fiction, I don't mind so much to see Sanosuke call Megumi 'kitsune', but if she calls him 'tori atama' (I think that's chicken head) I tend to cringe.  Point of the matter is, sometimes anime stories are just a wee bit excessive on the use of Japanese.  I try to keep mine to an absolute minimum and only use it when I think is necessary, but . . . sometimes I slip up (instances I have had Hisoka call Tsuzuki 'baka' instead of 'stupid' or 'idiot' for example).

Ahem.  The point of the matter is that Terazuma calls Tsuzuki 'sempai' in the manga, and he calls Tsuzuki sempai in this story.  I can't think of a literal translation for sempai anyway, and if I could, it would probably sound really dumb in English.

(I suppose that's rather funny, considering the title of this story is Japanese, but I named it after a song.  So…… yeah. ^^)

I also had trouble coming up for something Watari would call Terazuma by, and Terazuma likewise for Watari.  'Watari-san' just didn't seem to work coming from Terazuma, so that just got stuck as Watari.  Meanwhile I was tempted to have Watari call Terazuma 'Tera-chan' since he calls Terazuma's shikigami Kuro-chan, but I settled on Tera.  Far as I know, those two never directly speak to each other in the manga (yet, I suppose) so I just came up with something.

This chapter moves a bit quickly, but I want them to get into the thick of things as soon as I can.  So that's my excuse. ^_^;;

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Fourteen**

Tatsumi was far too much of a cheapskate to spring for more than two hotel rooms for the four shinigami in Tokyo.  He would have not given them enough for two, had a female not been amongst them.  However, because Wakaba had joined them, she was given a single room completely to herself, while Tsuzuki, Watari, and Terazuma were forced to share.  It was more than obvious after an hour that they arrived in Tokyo that the arrangements would not work.

But Tsuzuki and Terazuma suffered through with their dismal housing arrangements.  There were only two full sized beds in the room, and while the logical thing to do would have been to double up, all three refused, for various reasons.  Thus they traded turns sleeping in comfort.  Two would have the beds one night, while the unfortunate one would be forced to sleep on the floor.  This lasted a week, until Tsuzuki and Terazuma both began to complain terribly, and Wakaba finally offered to share her room with one of them.  None of the three was able to look beyond gender differences and accept her offer, however, and so the arrangements continued as they were.

A week and a half into their investigation, with no leads at all, Terazuma had finally become suffocated enough in the hotel that he simply had to leave.  And so that was how he ended up seated outside of a popular coffee shop in downtown Tokyo, Wakaba across from him and a cup of coffee in hand.  He had made a dramatic point of complaining about her coming along, but in truth, he hardly minded at all.

"Watari-san thinks we're at a dead end here," Wakaba said thoughtfully.  She had ordered a caramel mocha, that still sat barely touched in the circle of her arms, which were resting on the tabletop.

Terazuma had bought the morning paper before they had gone into the coffee shop, and over the top of the paper, he raised an eyebrow slightly at his younger partner.

"Where should we be looking then?" he asked, not intending to sound brusque, but coming off as such anyway.

"We've been here almost two weeks, and we still don't even know where Muraki's clinic is," Wakaba said thoughtfully.  "Tokyo's just way too big."

Terazuma folded the paper in his hands and set it down on the table.  A cigarette was hanging out the side of his mouth, as always, but he was not smoking it yet.

"Tsuzuki and Watari are looking," he replied.  He lifted his coffee mug to his lips and took a sip.  "But if nothing comes up again we'll try something else."

"Like what?" Wakaba pressed, inclining her head slightly at him.  Terazuma hated it when she gave him that innocent, wide-eyed look.

"Like . . . like . . . I don't know!  Stop looking at me like that!"

Wakaba made a face and settled back.  "You're so whiny, Hajime-chan."

"You were giving me the eye," Terazuma grumbled.  He picked up his carelessly folded paper and flipped it open once again, hoping to block her from his vision.

Settling her chin on her folded hands, Wakaba allowed her eyes to wander away, to watch the various people on the sidewalk that were passing the coffee shop.  Tsuzuki and Watari had been searching for Muraki's clinic for more than a week now, while she and Terazuma had been assigned to taking note of any mysterious happenings in the city that Muraki might have had connection to.  Thus far, they had no luck in either department.

It almost seemed that Muraki had taken Kaiki and simply vanished into nothingness.  That was how Watari had explained it when Muraki had taken Kai when they were in Kamakura.  They simply had no idea where he would have reappeared.

Tokyo was nothing but a dead end.

But if not here, where Muraki had told Tsuzuki personally that he had his practice, then where was he?

Wakaba sighed and chewed thoughtfully at her lower lip.  Wherever he was, she hoped that Kai was safe.

Almost two weeks and they had no leads at all.  Tsuzuki was beginning to become disheartened about the investigation.  Muraki would be found if he wanted to be found, he had proved that once before in Kyoto, but if he did not want them to find him then they never would.  Tsuzuki had not said this to any of the other shinigami, and while he would have never claimed to understand Muraki, he did think that he understood the man more than the others.  And what he knew for a fact was that Muraki did not want to be found.

They had started out with the most logical of places to begin searching for a doctor – the yellow pages.  When that had failed, they had given in to Wakaba's suggestion of simply calling up information and asking for Doctor Muraki Kazutaka.  They had found quite a few people with the same surname as his, but none with the first name Kazutaka, or a medical practice in downtown Tokyo.

Now he and Watari had taken to the streets.  Covering Tokyo by ground was far from Tsuzuki's idea of fun.  For one, the city was entirely too large, with far too many buildings and people, to be able to pinpoint just one person.  That included with his doubt that Muraki was even in the city, and even more doubt that Kaiki was with him, made Tsuzuki feel that they were doing nothing but running around in circles.

Watari was determined to keep looking.  Terazuma had no opinion of his own and did only as he instructed.  Tsuzuki knew that Wakaba agreed with him, but without any other leads, the suggestion of searching elsewhere was never brought up.  Watari had promised, however, that if they found nothing today, that they would contact Konoe and Tatsumi and ask what would be the best plan of action.

Shoving his hands into the pockets of the long jacket he wore, Tsuzuki followed Watari as the other shinigami lead him through the city, on another wild goose chase of his.  They had been at it long enough that 003, Watari's hyperactive owl, had gotten too tired to flit around them and had settled on Tsuzuki's shoulder to nap.  Tsuzuki was jealous that he couldn't do something like that.  It would have made the day pass much more quickly.

"Watari," Tsuzuki said, nearly whining, "it's practically four in the afternoon.  Can we stop and get something to eat?"

"You think only with your stomach," Watari chastised.  He did not even spare the other shinigami a glance over his shoulder.  Tsuzuki was tempted to bean 003 at his head.

"My stomach thinks for me," Tsuzuki corrected.  "And right now it's hungry.  C'mon, c'mon, please?  I'm starving!"

Watari looked back at him briefly, a smile on his face.  "One more place and then we'll have lunch."

"You sound like Tatsumi," Tsuzuki grumbled, but he accepted the compromise and followed along after Watari grudgingly.

He realized that Watari was worried about Kai, possibly more worried than any of them.  Watari was the only one that had actually had the chance to come to know him, given that they were partners.  Tsuzuki knew he would have been just as worried if he were in Watari's position and it was Hisoka that had been abducted by Muraki.

He frowned slightly, eyes wandering away from the sidewalk as it passed beneath his feet to the world around them.  Tatsumi had told him before they departed that Hisoka would be healed completely in another week and a half, possibly two weeks.  He supposed that by now, Hisoka would be up and walking, all traces of the injuries he had sustained in Kamakura gone.  But it was doubtful that Konoe and Tatsumi would allow him to be on field duty for at least another week.

Tsuzuki had hoped that by that time, this case would be done and over with.  Things didn't seem to be shaping up the way he had hoped.

"Uh, where are we going?" he asked finally, realizing he had absolutely no idea.  He had been following Watari blindly around for the past three days, after all.

"'They say one doctor knows another,'" Watari said.  It was a direct quote, Tsuzuki realized, of what Muraki had said to Tatsumi in Kamakura.

"We're going to see a doctor?" Tsuzuki asked dumbly.

"No, we're going to see Buddha," Watari replied.  "Yes, we're going to see a doctor."

Tsuzuki picked up 003 and hurtled him at Watari's head.  The poor miniature owl collided with the head of his master with a dull thump, before falling rather unceremoniously to the ground.  Watari grumbled and rubbed at the back of his head.

"That beak hurts y'know!"

Tsuzuki beamed innocently.

003 continued to sit where he had fallen, seeing stars.  Taking pity on him, Tsuzuki picked him up and returned him to his shoulder.

"There have to be thousands of doctors in Tokyo," Tsuzuki said pointedly.  "How do you know we're not running into just another dead end?"

"I did some research and found Muraki's last known address in Tokyo.  There's a practice not far from there.  It's a long shot, but worth it if it gives us even the slightest hint, right?"

Tsuzuki sighed.  "I guess so."

Despite not having ever been to Tokyo while he was alive, and very few times in his afterlife, Watari seemed to know his way around quite well.  Tsuzuki was surprised when they arrived at a small practice in hardly no time at all.

Watari lead the way in.  A young receptionist was seated behind the counter, and as they entered, she looked up at them with a bright, friendly smile.

"Hello," she greeted.  "Is there anything I can help you with?"

Tsuzuki glanced at Watari.  He sincerely hoped he had some vague idea of what he was doing, or this was nothing but yet another dead end.

"Yes, actually," Watari said with a bright smile of his own, surprising Tsuzuki.  Apparently he had thought this out more than the other shinigami had thought.

"I just recently moved back to Tokyo, you see, and when I lived here before my doctor was a man by the name of Muraki Kazutaka.  But now I can't seem to find him.  I was hoping that you might have some idea of where he ended up."

The receptionist frowned slightly.  "Doctor Muraki Kazutaka, you said?"

"Yes," Watari confirmed with a nod.  "Do you know him?"

"The name seems familiar . . . hold on a moment and I'll ask Dr. Sakano."

She stood up and bustled away, leaving the shinigami in peace.  Tsuzuki occupied a vacant chair in the waiting room and propped his feet up on the one across from him.

"Some of your experiments work after all."

Watari beamed.  "I am, after all, a world-class scientist."

"I think it's just blind luck."

Watari held up his nose haughtily.  "What would you know of science and experimentation?  You are a heathen."

Tsuzuki blinked.  "I am /not/ a heathen!"

"Gentlemen?"

Tsuzuki and Watari looked up from their antics to find that the receptionist had returned with the doctor.  He was not a very elderly man, though Tsuzuki and Watari appeared far younger than him, even though Tsuzuki had a good forty years over both of them.  He wore black-rimmed glasses and overall reminded Tsuzuki terribly of the man that Muraki had been working with while in Kyoto, but he carefully kept that thought to himself.

"My receptionist said that you are looking for Muraki Kazutaka."

"Ah, yes," Watari answered.  "Do you know him?"

"Vaguely," Dr. Sakano responded, and the way he said it made Tsuzuki wonder if he were telling the complete truth.

"Muraki-san had a practice not far from here," he continued.  "But he abandoned it a little less than a year ago.  We were business colleagues, no more."

Tsuzuki frowned.  That statement confirmed it – there was something more that Sakano was not telling them.

"Do you know where we can find him?" Watari asked.

"No," Sakano answered.  "I have not seen him since then."  He was shuffling through papers on the receptionist's desk distractedly.  "Now, gentleman, if you have no further need of me may I ask you to leave?  I run a business here, not a lost and found."

Watari nodded slightly, a frown like Tsuzuki's crossing his face.  "I'm sorry for taking your time.  Thank you for your help."

Sakano did not bother to give them a word of parting when they left his practice.

Outside, Tsuzuki shoved his hands back into the pockets of his jacket, considering what they had just been told.  As it turned out, he and Wakaba had been right in their assumptions that Tokyo was no more than a dead end.  If Muraki had abandoned his practice in the city a year ago, then it was quite likely that he was not in the city.  Which meant that they would have to search elsewhere.

"He was hiding something," Watari said thoughtfully.

"Yeah," Tsuzuki agreed.  "But we have no idea /what/ he's hiding . . ."

"Protecting Muraki, maybe?" Watari suggested.

Tsuzuki shrugged.  "Who knows . . . but whatever the case, I doubt that Muraki's still here in Tokyo.  He might have even suspected us to come here to look for him, and so he hightailed it to somewhere else."

"Where, is the problem."

"Yeah . . ."

"No matter," Watari said brightly.  "Let's just head back to the hotel and let Wakaba-chan and Tera know what we found."

With the low budget Tatsumi was keeping them on, the shinigami could only afford a small pizza for dinner, but given that they had more important things to be concerned with, no one complained much.  Tsuzuki was disappointed that he would have to go yet another day without dessert, but he learned to bear with it.

Watari had explained to Terazuma and Wakaba what he and Tsuzuki had discovered at Dr. Sakano's practice, and the two other shinigami were currently chewing on that information.  It seemed very little to go by, to Terazuma anyway, but he supposed something was better than nothing.

"I don't think if we tried to interrogate that guy anymore we'd get anything out of him," Terazuma said.  He was seated in one of the room's two leather chairs, his feet propped up on the table between them by the pizza box.  The crust of his slice sat discarded, while he continued to chew thoughtfully on the cigarette in his mouth.

"Maybe if just Hajime-chan and I went to talk to him?" Wakaba suggested.  "He wouldn't talk if it was the two of you again but maybe . . ."

"It'd be too suspicious to have more people coming back and asking about Muraki all of a sudden," Watari said pointedly.  "Until we come up with something we have to make do with what we have."

"Which is pretty much nothing at all," Tsuzuki said.  All they knew was that Muraki had abandoned his medical practice in Tokyo a year ago, and that Sakano seemed to have some connection to him.  Tsuzuki hardly thought that was enough to make a solid case on.

"Well, we do know that Muraki can't be in Tokyo," Watari said thoughtfully.  "So where else would he be?"

Wakaba sighed and settled her chin on her hands.  "There's so /many/ places.  We'd have to search all of Japan."

"And he could have hightailed it out of Japan too," Terazuma said, to be the bearer of bad news.  He unfolded the newspaper he had bought that morning and flipped through it while the others talked.

"What I want to know is what he wanted with Kai," Tsuzuki said, voicing the one concern that they had all had in the very beginning, but never spoken about.

There seemed to be no solid reason.  Muraki had never made it clear to him, and Kai did not have enough memories of his past to piece together where Muraki had once been connected to him.  Tsuzuki could not even begin to make an assumption.

"When we were in Kamakura..." he began, slowly, "he said that we had something that belonged to him.  He meant Kai."

"He also looked at something on the kid's collarbone, or chest maybe," Watari put in.  "Remember, when he said that Kai really was the one he was looking for?"

Tsuzuki frowned.  He had nearly forgotten that, but as he began to recall it to memory, he realized how odd it was.  None of them had ever noticed anything identifiable about Kai below his neckline before.  Of course, none of them had ever seen him without a shirt on.  Tsuzuki supposed it could have been anything.  Marks even, maybe, like those that Hisoka had on his body.  Muraki could have cursed Kai the same way a long time ago.

"Watari, did the Gushoshin do any background checks on Kai?" Tsuzuki asked.

"They do background checks on everyone that becomes a shinigami," Watari replied.  "But if they noticed anything odd about him, they would have told us."

"We could contact them and ask them to send us what information they have on Kai," Wakaba suggested.  "Maybe it'll give us some clue on how he and Muraki are connected.  That way, it might be easier to find them."

"It's easy to figure out how they're connected," Terazuma said suddenly, calling their attention to him.  "Kai had it branded in his arm, remember?  'Muraki killed my mother.'  Before he lost his memory, he was probably just some kid trying to get revenge."

Watari sighed.  "Well, that doesn't exactly tell us anything . . ."

"Wha . . . hey!"

Wakaba suddenly reached out and snatched the newspaper that Terazuma was holding from his hands.  Startled, his cigarette felt out of his mouth and onto the floor.

"Hey!  Kannuki!  What the hell--"

"You didn't notice this?"

Terazuma and the other shinigami blinked.  Wakaba sighed and turned the paper around to face them.  Across the page a headline reading 'Three Murders in Kyoto' was spread out in thick, bold letters.  Terazuma had never noticed it because that sort of thing was not of as much interest to him as the comics section.

"In Kyoto?" Watari murmured, reaching out to take the paper from Wakaba.  His eyes skimmed it thoroughly.

"They started just before we arrived in Tokyo," Wakaba said pointedly.  "And the last two have happened while we've been here.  If we ever bothered to keep an eye on the news, we would have known."

Tsuzuki had flopped down on the bed beside Watari and was reading over his shoulder.  "Three murders . . . has to be more than coincidence."

"Yeah," Watari agreed, "especially when all three victims had their hair cut."

Tsuzuki paled.

"What?" Terazuma asked.  "I don't get it."

Unwanted memories of Kyoto flooded back to Tsuzuki.  Images rushed at him.  He saw Hisoka, standing on those bloodied steps, a murdered body at his feet.  Muraki stood above him, silhouetted by the red moon.  He remembered that night, when Muraki had asked him about his scars, and why he wore his watch on his right hand.  But most of all he remembered Touda's flames, enveloping him, slowly killing him, before Hisoka had come.

Tsuzuki had never wanted to have any more bad memories of that city.  And after all that had happened there, between he and Hisoka and Muraki, he never wanted to return again.  But it seemed that they were being baited once again.

"Muraki cut the hair of the victims in Kyoto, a year ago," Watari explained briefly.  Terazuma needed no more information than that – he knew everything that had happened then.  "So . . . he must be doing it again, to get us to go to Kyoto."

He glanced at Tsuzuki.  "What do you think?"

"I think . . . the only thing we can do . . . is go to Kyoto."

Without constant explosions caused by Watari and whines from Tsuzuki, or complaints from Terazuma and cooking by Wakaba, Hisoka thought that the Shokan Division was ridiculously quiet and lonely.  He would have been grateful for the silence, if only his mind was not constantly occupied by Tsuzuki and the others, and wondering if they would be all right on their own.

He knew it was stupid to worry.  There were four of him, and his added addition would hardly make a difference in the long run.  But he would have felt much better if he could have been there with them.

He had healed almost completely from the injuries sustained in Kamakura.  His legs had healed and he was walking quite well on his own, but the infirmary doctors, backed up by Tatsumi, refused to let him do field duty for at least another week.  Hisoka thought he might very well go mad in that time worrying about the other shinigami.

The first few days had passed relatively well.  He had taken his time away from field duty as an opportunity to be in the library more often, but as he began to read the same books twice, that had bored him.  After that it had been a matter of simply wasting the days away.  The afterlife, he realized, was amazingly boring, which was rather disappointing.  He would have hoped that death could have offered him some distractions that life had been unable to.

A week and a half into his forced vacation, he decided that enough was enough, and thus he went to see Tatsumi, maybe to demand to join Tsuzuki and the other shinigami if he could.  He found the older shinigami seated in his office, looking perplexed.  That stopped Hisoka from demanding immediately that he be put on field duty.

"Tatsumi-san?"

Tatsumi looked up.  "Ah, Kurosaki-kun.  Come in."

Hisoka slipped into the office and dropped into the chair across from Tatsumi.  Tatsumi removed his glasses and rubbed thoughtfully at the bridge of his nose.

"It seems that they have made some progress in their search for Muraki."

Hisoka frowned.  "That's good, right?"

"Perhaps."  Tatsumi paused.  "Three deaths were recorded recently in the Kiseki, all three murders in Kyoto.  We thought nothing of them – murder is not uncommon in large cities.  What we did not take note of was the fact that all three victims had potions of their hair cut off."

"What . . .?  Then, you mean . . ."

Tatsumi nodded.  "Muraki seems to be killing people in the same fashion he did in Kyoto to lure us to him."

Hisoka frowned.  If that was his tactic to lure Tsuzuki in, he had chosen a great, if not perfect one.  Tsuzuki never wanted to see people hurt because of him.  The simple fact alone that Muraki was killing those people to draw out he and the other shinigami would bring out Tsuzuki, but Hisoka did not think that he would be able to face the man if it came down to that.

Tsuzuki wasn't going to be able to do this alone.

"Tatsumi-san--"

"I know what you are going to ask," Tatsumi interrupted him.  "And though it goes against my better judgment, I think you should go to Kyoto to be with Tsuzuki.  He will need you there with him."

Hisoka paused, regarding Tatsumi for a moment thoughtfully.  He knew how Tatsumi felt about Tsuzuki.  He had always known, while Tsuzuki seemed oblivious to the older shinigami's affection for him.  He wondered how, if it was hard for Tatsumi to let Tsuzuki be happy with someone else, did he keep pressuring for Hisoka to be with him?

He shook his head.  It was ridiculous to think about that anyway – he and Tsuzuki were nothing more than partners.

"Thank you, Tatsumi-san," he said softly.

Tatsumi smiled.  "You had better go quickly.  They should have already arrived by now."

"A-aa . . ."

Tatsumi had arranged far better living arrangements for them in Kyoto than he had the year before when they were there, and as well, far better than the arrangements in Tokyo.  Tsuzuki thought it was somewhat excessive to have three rooms, Terazuma and Wakaba each to one of their own, but he supposed he should forget about it and simply be grateful that he was no longer sleeping on the floor.  Nor did he have to listen to Terazuma snore through the night either.

Once they had contacted Tatsumi and told him that they needed to be in Kyoto, not Tokyo, he had made the immediate arrangements to get them there.  Before a day was over they had arrived in the city.  Tsuzuki thought he was holding together fairly well the first afternoon – but once night fell and the memories returned, he knew that this would be one of the most difficult things he had to do in his entire life.

It was that evening that there came a knock at the door of the hotel room he was sharing with Watari.  The other shinigami was not there – he and Wakaba had gone out to take in the sights while they still could, possibly pick up some information along the way.  Tsuzuki frowned slightly and wandered over to answer the door.

Terazuma stood there, looking vaguely uncomfortable.

"Yo, sempai."  He shoved his hands in his pockets, teeth working at the cigarette in his mouth methodically, eyes on the ground.  "'m bored.  So wanna go out into the city?"  He paused, then continued quickly, "Since Kannuki and Watari are out anyway, probably off seeing some show or something, it's not like you or me has anything better to do.  We might pick up on some useful stuff too."

Tsuzuki had to blink at him.  In the entire time he had known Terazuma, he had never seen him this flustered unless he was around Wakaba.  He might have laughed or teased him, but given their situation, he decided to go with his better judgment.

"Sure.  Sounds good."

Terazuma was slightly startled by his willingness to agree, but did not complain.  Together, the two shinigami, well bundled against the cold air of Kyoto that time of year, left the hotel and ventured into the city.

Neither was much interested in taking in the sights, and most forms of entertainment would have cost them a bundle of money neither was willing to waste.  They wandered aimlessly, not speaking, but there was a companionable silence hanging over them, something that they had never quite had before.

An hour or so passed this way, until finally, Terazuma ventured to speak.

"Kannuki and Watari'll be back by now," he said.  "So we should get back."

Tsuzuki nodded. "Yea--"

A scream ripping through the air interrupted him.

Tsuzuki and Terazuma exchanged glances briefly before coming to a silent, unanimous decision to find where it had come from.  Terazuma had a heightened sense of hearing, one of the few things he had been blessed with when he had joined with his shikigami, and took off running in exactly the right direction.  Tsuzuki raced after him blindly.

He was not sure how much time had passed before Terazuma suddenly came to an abrupt stop.  Tsuzuki started to speak, but Terazuma held up a hand, silencing him.  They stood, breathing hard, and listening.

Another scream, this time much closer.

Terazuma ran down the alleyway and vaulted himself over the wire fence preventing them from the side.  Tsuzuki followed, with just as much ease as the younger shinigami.

He nearly ran into Terazuma when he stopped again, in a garden behind one of the hundreds of shrines throughout Kyoto.

"Terazuma, wha . . ."

He stopped abruptly as he saw the reason why Terazuma had stopped.

Kaiki was kneeled on the ground, hands bloodied, cheeks streaked with red, and a hand clasped over an open wound.  The body of a murdered woman was at his knees.

"I tried!  I tried to . . . I--I tried to stop him . . . he ran . . . off that way."

"Terazuma," Tsuzuki said sharply.

"Gotcha."  Terazuma needed no other command to hurry in the direction that Kai had indicated.

Tsuzuki knelt down beside the shuddering boy.  Gingerly, he reached out and touched his shoulder.  Kai looked up at him, his silver eyes wide with fear and shock.

"I tried to stop him," Kai repeated deliriously.

"I know," Tsuzuki said.  "Are you hurt?"

Kai slowly removed his hand from his stomach.  Tsuzuki saw that he had been slashed with a knife, and while deep, it was not deep enough to be life-threatening.  He breathed a sigh of relief.

And then frowned when he saw a bloodied knife clutched in the hand of the victim.

"Kai, what happened?"

"He had a knife," Kai said.  "He tried to kill her, but she had one too . . . f-for protection.  She got him across the face, but then I got in the way, and he-he . . ."

Tsuzuki put both hands on Kai's shoulders.  "It's okay.  You don't have to say anymore."

"He shot her," Kai whispered.  "When he saw things weren't going to work like he wanted, he shot her and ran . . ."

Tsuzuki could vaguely piece it together.  He, no doubt Muraki from how badly it had shaken up Kai, had intended to kill this woman, and during the struggle she was able to wound him.  Then Kai had intervened, and Muraki had stabbed him as well . . . then Muraki had given up on murdering her in cold blood and had shot her.  There was a bullet hole in the center of her forehead, that made Tsuzuki feel sick to look at.

"See."  Kai raised a shaky hand and gestured to the body.  "He was able to stab her a few times, but not enough to kill her, so he shot her . . ."

"It's okay, Kai.  Just . . . don't say anymore.  You're going to be okay."

A twig being snapped beneath a foot caused Tsuzuki to look up.  Terazuma had returned.

"There's nobody," he said.  "He got away."

Tsuzuki cursed softly below his breath.

"Let's just get Kai out of here," he said quietly.

Terazuma removed his jacket, with a small amount of trouble, they eventually succeeded into tearing it into strips.  Tsuzuki wrapped the make-shift gauze around Kai's wound firmly.  Once he was certain that Kai would be able to make it, he helped the younger shinigami up and slowly began to walk away with him.

Terazuma started to follow, but as he passed the body, he stopped and frowned.  Something seemed to be . . . missing here.  This crime was too carelessly planned to be murder in Muraki's style – he was a perfectionist.  This was messy, not at all like him.

"What the hell, what the hell . . ." Terazuma paced, muttering a moment, then stopped.

Shoving his hands into his pockets, chewing on his cigarette, he looked up to the sky.

"This isn't right at all . . ."


	16. Chapter Sixteen

**Notes:** . . . you know, I have no idea what season it is.  I assume cold, because thus far I have had the characters wear jackets, but I think that was done unconsciously.  I was thinking about it and remembered that, currently, it's a year after what happened in Kyoto.  It had to have been winter then, because we all recall the infamous scene where Tsuzuki runs out of the bar into the snow and Hisoka hugs him.  'cause it was all 'aw-ish' and all . . . ^.^

Anyway, that in mind . . . made it winter, because it seemed appropriate.

Also, slow work on this chapter . . . it was just . . . no idea.  Simply very hard to do this one for some reason.  No real excuse but that.

Randomly, Kagankokushungei is a damn long name for a shikigami -- the name of the one Terazuma can transform into -- and impossible to memorize. -.-;; Thank goodness I can just call it Kuro thanks to Watari's cute little Kuro-chan nickname for him.

**Yami no Kenzoku**

**Chapter Fifteen**

Watari and Wakaba had taken immediate actions to seeing that Kaiki was properly taken care of when Tsuzuki and Terazuma returned with the bloodied boy.  Feeling that they would be in the way, the latter two shinigami retreated to the room Tsuzuki and Watari were sharing.  Neither seemed to have anything to say, too wound up in their own thoughts to even attempt small talk, or casual flinging of insults.

Terazuma had been a detective during his lifetime, and while he had never been a very good one, he could not shake the feeling that something was amiss about the way they had found Kai.  While in most instances, giving what he had seen and what Kai had told Tsuzuki, he would have been able to piece something together, in this case there seemed to be /too much/ evidence.  The more evidence the more complex something became, and the more difficult to come up with a valid, logical solution.

The police would have come along and cleaned up the body by now, he supposed, giving him no chance to examine it further even if he had wanted to.  From what he had seen at the scene, however, she had been cut multiple times with a knife, and when that had not worked, the murderer had panicked.  It was the second scream that would have been her scream of death – when she was being slashed to death and had made a last plea for help.  The murderer had panicked then and shot her to silence her.

It was too messy.  Terazuma couldn't look beyond that fact.  He did not know Muraki personally, much less seen what crimes he left in his wake, but from what he had heard, the man seemed to be absolutely meticulous about his murders.  Muraki would have never taken a chance that could have allowed the woman to scream a second time; he would have done it quickly and efficiently.

Unfortunately, Muraki was their only suspect.  He was the only one that knew how the women a year before had been murdered, how their hair had been cut . . . and Kai had said himself that it was Muraki that had murdered her.

So /why/ was something missing?

"Dammit."  Terazuma cursed below his breath.  "I don't get it."

Tsuzuki did not seem to have heard him, something Terazuma was thankful for.  He did not want to begin to explain his doubts when everyone else was simply so relieved that Kai was all right.  Muraki would come later.

Watari and Wakaba returned shortly from Terazuma's room, where Kai would be staying for the evening.  Tsuzuki looked up at them immediately.

"Is he okay?"

"He was really tired," Wakaba said.  She plopped down beside Terazuma, and for once, he didn't complain about her close proximity.

Watari settled down in a chair across from Tsuzuki.  "We didn't want to ask him about what had happened so soon, so we'll have to wait until tomorrow to find out what's wrong."

Tsuzuki nodded.  "I figured."

Terazuma kept his mouth shut and shared his suspicions with no one the entire evening.

It was hard to believe so many terrible things had happened here, Tsuzuki reflected as he walked through the former capital of Japan.  Almost as hard as it was to believe that it had been a year since that time, and unwillingly, he was being forced to relive those memories on the day of their anniversary.

Kaiki was sleeping well into the morning.  Watari and Wakaba had stayed with him, to be there when he did wake up.  Terazuma had gruffly told all of them that morning that he had some personal business of his own to take care of, and no amount of nettling on Wakaba's part could get him to reveal his intentions.  Tsuzuki, never having been one that was very patient, had decided to take a walk through the city, for lack of anything better to do.

It was difficult to not be depressed now that he was here.  He did a good job of presenting a smile for his friends, when on the inside he was frowning, and he did an even better job of keeping up the careless, nonchalant way he had about him.  Inside his emotions were whirling through his head.  He was anxious and nervous and troubled all in one.  He was confused.  He felt hopeless.  And being in Kyoto was not making him feel much better.

Not that, when he thought about it, there was anything that /could/ make him feel better.  He had to come to terms with what had happened in Kyoto a year ago on his own, whether he liked it or not.

Still . . . he wondered if the reason Muraki had led them here was because there was something they had forgotten while in the city . . . something they had glossed over; something that was going to come back to bite them.

Sighing, hands in pockets, amethyst eyes downcast, Tsuzuki hoped that it was nothing like that.  He wasn't sure if he would be able to live through a repeat of the Kyoto incident.

"Hey."

Startled, Tsuzuki turned toward the voice.  He was in spirit form, no one could see him . . .

Hisoka stood there, hands in pockets, looking at him with an even gaze.

"Going to get your fortune read?"  He gestured vaguely to the fortune shop Tsuzuki had ended up at.  Only then did Tsuzuki recognize it as the same one that Hisoka had found him that morning a year ago, after he had spent that night with Muraki . . .

"Hisoka," he breathed, surprise evident in his voice.  "What are you doing here?"

"Tatsumi sent me," Hisoka replied nonchalantly.  He was not about to admit that he had fully intended to demand that Tatsumi allow him to go.  "Said I could be of some help."

Tsuzuki nodded after a brief moment of surprise.  "Yeah, I guess that's true.  Uhm . . . are you . . . okay now?"

"No, I'm not, that's why I'm standing here," Hisoka replied with a roll of his eyes, but there was barely a hint of sarcasm in his voice.  Tsuzuki smiled.

"It's nice to have the old Hisoka back."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Snappy and withdrawn and mean . . . I missed it so much!"

Hisoka blinked furiously as Tsuzuki suddenly sprouted puppy ears, complete with an excitedly wagging tail, and latched onto him.  After a moment of struggling to pry him off, he gave up with a sigh and allowed his shoulders to slump dejectedly.

". . .you're such an idiot, Tsuzuki."

Tsuzuki pulled away from him, a bright smile on his face.  "I know."

Hisoka looked at him for a moment, then rolled his eyes and pushed him gently away.

"I thought we should go talk to that guy Oriya," he said.

Tsuzuki blinked.  Oriya was the man that was a close, personal friend to Muraki, and often aided him in whatever recent scheme Muraki had on his hands, albeit a bit reluctantly.  They should have thought to go speak to him sooner.  Doubtful he would be forthcoming with information on where Muraki was or what he was doing, but it was better than sitting around and doing nothing at all.

"Okay," Tsuzuki said slowly.  He nodded.  "Yeah, I think I remember where that is.  We can go."

That decided, the two shinigami started off, walking side to by side.  Hisoka was glad to be back in the working routine with Tsuzuki.  When they were working, there were less things for him to worry about.  He had only the assignment to consider, unlike the trivial adolescent thoughts that bothered him constantly when he was not working.  Things like what he and Tsuzuki were to each other, what he would do if he did not have Tsuzuki . . . those things.

Ko Kaku Rou, a brothel that disguised itself as a restaurant, was in a densely populated area of Kyoto, secluded from the excitement of the city and surrounded by the tranquility of the shrines.  It would be closed this time of morning, both shinigami knew, but its owner would still be there.  He lived there, after all.

They did not bother with the main entrance, and instead went around to the back, into the small garden that brought back sudden, abrupt images to Hisoka.  It was here that he had challenged Oriya.  He had lost that duel, he knew.  In some way he had lost, and in the end, it was only out of pity that Oriya had given him the access cards.

"Hisoka?"

He blinked, clearing the memory from his vision, and slowly focusing on Tsuzuki.  "Hm?"

"You went far and away again," Tsuzuki said.  "You do that a lot."

"Oh."  Hisoka paused, taking a moment to consider what that meant, then shrugged.  "The last time I was here, I was fighting Oriya.  I was thinking about that."

"Ah," Tsuzuki said, nodding.  

He did not know exactly what had happened that night -- even the images of what happened to /him/ were hazy at best -- but he knew that Hisoka had fought for him.  Hisoka had saved him a year ago, never giving up on him, no matter what the situation.  He did not think Hisoka knew how grateful he was for that, or even if he could express in words what it meant to him.

"The polite thing to do," interjected a new voice, "would have been to call and make an appointment rather than showing up unexpectedly.  'ch.  People these days."

Tsuzuki and Hisoka whirled.  Dressed in his colorful garments, long hair unbound and following over his shoulders, Oriya stood before an open screen door on the porch, smoking a long pipe and regarding them evenly.  He did not seem to be at all perplexed by their appearance.  No, he rather seemed to have been expecting it.

His eyes shifted to Hisoka and the side of his mouth quirked slightly.  "Hello, bouya," he greeted.  "Glad to see you're still alive.  There are few opponents quite like you in the world anymore."

He paused, gaze leaving Hisoka to regard Tsuzuki for a moment.  There was an expression in his eyes that neither shinigami could identify.  Hisoka thought he saw a brief glimmer of something, something like contempt . . . but then  as abruptly as it was there, it was gone just as abruptly.

"So what do you shinigami want?" Oriya asked.  He smiled slightly.  "Certainly not a girl for the evening."

Tsuzuki coughed several times into his hand.  Hisoka rolled his eyes.

"You must know about the murders that have been happening here in Kyoto," he said.  "The victims were all women, and all of them had their hair cut off.  Reminds you of someone else's style, doesn't it?"

Oriya looked at him evenly, unfazed.  He blew out a tendril of smoke thoughtfully.  "A little," he said at length.  "Natural for you to immediately assume it's Muraki, isn't it?"

"Who else would do it?" Tsuzuki interjected.

"How should I know?" Oriya said.  "I hardly have the mind of a mass murderer."

"No, but you do hang out with one a lot," Hisoka said.

Oriya said nothing.  The way he skittered around the subject made Hisoka wonder if he did know something, and was simply unwilling to share the information with them.  That was fine.  They had other means of extracting what they wanted from people.  Not necessarily means he wanted to fall back on, but if it was necessary to solve the case, he would.

Oriya abruptly turned and went inside.  Hisoka started to call after him, but Tsuzuki placed a hand on his shoulder, silencing him.  Oriya returned seconds later, carrying two sheathed katanas.  He kept one and tossed the other to Hisoka.

"If you win, I'll tell you what I know," he said.  He shrugged.  "If you truly want to know.  My knowledge may prove to be disappointing."

Tsuzuki looked at Hisoka.  "You don't have to.  He may not know anything at all."

Hisoka was silent a moment, then shook his head.  "I have to at least try," he replied, and he took a step forward to join Oriya in the center of the garden.

Tsuzuki stood silently as Oriya and Hisoka faced one another, neither making a move to be the one to begin the match.  Oriya always allowed his opponent the first strike, and Hisoka had learned from his previous duel with the man, that it was his way of judging his opponent's abilities and finding a weakness in them.  Tsuzuki thought for a moment that they would do nothing but stare one another down the entire morning, until finally, Oriya made a move.

He attacked high and Hisoka defended low.  Oriya did not stop there.  He kept on the offensive, continually advancing on Hisoka, and hardly allowing the shinigami a chance to retaliate, only to defend.  Hisoka was backed up at the opposite end of the garden before he saw an opening and took it; Oriya had to leap back quickly to avoid being struck.

"You have gotten better," he said, but it did not sound like a compliment, so much as it did a simple fact.  Hisoka did not allow it to distract him.

Tsuzuki had never understood swordplay, and it seemed to him that all that was happening was the rapid flashing of swords, so quick that he could hardly make out which was which, or define who had the upper hand.  Unconsciously, he had gripped his hands into fists at his sides.  He did not want Hisoka to get hurt.  He had only just recovered from two broken legs, and here he was, straining himself for something they didn't even know would be useful to them.  Tsuzuki would blame himself if anything happened to him.

Suddenly Hisoka made a sound of pain.  It happened too quick for Tsuzuki to know exactly what had happened, but one moment Hisoka had been defending, and now he stood clutching his wounded shoulder.  Blood seeped out from between his fingers.

"Hisoka!"

"It's all right," Hisoka said, but his voice was strained.  "It's not deep."  He waited a moment, then pulled his hand away.  The wound had already begun to heal.  Tsuzuki sighed.

Oriya advanced on him.  Hisoka defended, using only one hand for the time being.  Once the wound had completely healed over and all that remained was a dull throb to remind him it had once been there, he gripped the katana with both hands and fought back more aggressively.  Having not expected it, Oriya was taken off guard by the sudden assault, but the relaxed expression on his face did not change.  To him, this was nothing to overly concern himself with.  It was just morning exercise.

"You're more determined than before," Oriya said, raising his katana to deflect a blow.  "What do you fight for that is so important this time?"

Hisoka narrowed his eyes, reared back, and rushed forward blindly.  Oriya met the onslaught without concern and shoved him away.  Hisoka nearly fell, but managed to catch his balance just barely.  His hands went to his knees, one clutching the katana hilt tightly.  His breathing was coming out shallow and hurried.

_To defeat Muraki . . ._

He launched forward, katana held high over his head.  Oriya side stepped him and brought his blade back around, its blunt side catching Hisoka on his lower back.  He stumbled and fell to the ground.

"Hisoka!  You don't have to do this!"

_My friends . . ._

Straining against the pain, he forced himself to stand.

_Tsuzuki._

Oriya did not have the chance to defend.  It happened too quickly.  One moment the boy was prone on the ground, and then, abruptly, he was standing, katana clutched tightly in both hands.  He started forward, his steps faltering and slow, and Oriya had thought for a moment that the duel was his.  That was his mistake.  It was at that moment the blade connected, blunt end, but with enough force behind it to drive the air from his lungs and to knock him flat on the ground.

He closed his eyes.

"Not bad."

Hisoka tossed the katana aside.  "If you knew what you were fighting for, you would have won."

Oriya's eyes snapped open.  Then, expression softening, he closed them again and smiled.

"You're right."

He slowly stood up, rubbing his bruised chest, more theatrically than because he thought it might lessen the throb of pain.  Seeing that neither intended to make another move, Tsuzuki hurried over to Hisoka and clapped both hands on his shoulders.

"Are you okay?"

Hisoka looked up at him and, slowly, began to smile.  "I'm fine," he said.  He brought up a hand and placed it over Tsuzuki's on his shoulder.  "You worry too much."

He turned to face Oriya, hand falling away from Tsuzuki's, but the older shinigami kept a hand on his shoulder.  He did not mind.  It was almost comforting to him, to know that Tsuzuki was there, and had been with him this time, unlike before.  Tsuzuki did not know it, and Hisoka doubted he would ever understand, but that time, and this time, Tsuzuki had been the only thing driving him.  He would have given up if he hadn't had the thought of Tsuzuki in his mind to drive him forward.

Oriya had taken a seat on the porch, had his long pipe in hand, and was smoking it thoughtfully.  He gestured them forward.

"You won, bouya," he said.  "What would you like to know?"

Hisoka glanced at Tsuzuki.  The older shinigami took a step forward.

"Did Muraki ever work with a man named Sakano in Tokyo?"

"Sakano?"  Oriya was quiet a moment, contemplative.  At length, he shrugged.  "There are many people named Sakano in Tokyo."

"He runs a practice not far from where Muraki had his," Tsuzuki said.  He wondered if Oriya was being vague because he did not want to be outright with what they wanted to know, or because he honestly needed more information.

"I think I remember him mentioning a man named Sakano," Oriya said finally, slowly.  "Awhile ago."

"Did they work together?" Tsuzuki asked.

Oriya shrugged.  "Maybe."  At the look of frustration the answer brought to Tsuzuki's face, he inclined his head slightly, looking at the shinigami as though he should have expected nothing more.  "Muraki has connections to hundreds of people -- you expect me to remember all of them?"

"When did you last see Muraki?" Hisoka interjected.

"Last night."  Oriya paused.  "He had a wound that needed tending.  Of course, he came to me . . ."  He shook his head.  "Doctors never go to doctors.  They don't trust them."

Tsuzuki was silent a moment.  Kaiki had said that he had seen Muraki the night before, and there had been a struggle between the two of them.  Muraki had been attempting to kill that woman.  Tsuzuki recalled that she had a knife clutched in her hand when he and Terazuma had discovered she and Kai.  The knife had been covered in blood.  She must have been able to wound Muraki, before Kai came, or maybe in the struggle . . .

Or something.  It was too hard to piece together now, not because it was a matter of not having enough evidence, because it was a matter of having /too much/.  And that seemed too messy . . . 

"What about Kai?" Tsuzuki asked.  "Muraki kidnapped him in Kamakura, but when he found him, he must have escaped or something . . ."

"Oh, that gold-haired boy," Oriya said.  "Mm.  Who knows."

"You have no idea?" Hisoka asked.

Oriya shook his head.

"Where did Muraki go after he left here?" Tsuzuki questioned.

"His own home, I'd imagine."

Hisoka did not think that Oriya was keeping anything from them.  Though he was Muraki's friend, and unwilling to put him in danger, he was an honorable person.  He would not have challenge Hisoka if he had not intended to follow through with his promise.  It just seemed that Oriya knew as little, or even less, than they did.  They were getting no where fast.

Finally, Tsuzuki asked, "Why is Muraki killing these people?  What does he have to gain?"

Oriya looked at him, eyes hard and cool.  "Who's to say Muraki is the one killing them?"

Tsuzuki did not respond immediately, and looked for a moment as though he had not even considered that an option.  They had all been so insistent that Muraki was the one responsible for the murders, the only one that knew what had happened a year ago and would have been able to mimic it so well, they had not even considered that it might have been someone else.

But it seemed impossible.  Who else could it be?

"He is not the only one that knows what happened here a year ago, or about those murders," Oriya said.  "You know, the boy knows, your fellow shinigami know.  Not only that, it was all over the newspapers."

"You're telling us that it's some copycat," Hisoka said.  "Some crazy person that just randomly decided to repeat those murders from a year ago."

Oriya shrugged.  "I'm saying keep your options open.  Otherwise . . . you just set yourself up for failure."

Hands thrust into the pockets of her winter coat, Wakaba stepped outside of the hotel they were staying in and into the crisp air.  She had spent the entire morning with Watari and Kaiki, the latter whom had yet to have woken up since Tsuzuki and Terazuma had brought him in the night before.  The environment had become so suffocating that she had apologized to Watari and said that she needed a breath of fresh air, but he had not minded.  He promised to stay with Kai, to be there when he did finally wake up.

Tsuzuki and Terazuma had left earlier that morning, and neither had yet to return.  Wakaba was beginning to worry about them.  Tsuzuki often did these like this, disappearing for hours at a time, mostly because he had discovered some dessert shop and was indulging himself in sweets.  Terazuma did not.  He never left without reason, but this morning he had, without giving them any idea of where he was going.

Something was bothering him, that much Wakaba could tell.  The problem was, she had no idea what it was, and did not expect him to be forthcoming with information.  Terazuma never went out of his way to share himself with others.  He had been burned too many times in the past to leave himself open to new wounds.

Sighing, her breath coming out chilled on the air, she started down the sidewalk.  She supposed she would take a walk around the block, then join Watari upstairs again.  She didn't want to leave him all alone.

In hardly any time at all, she had circled around the block and was standing before the hotel again.  She glanced up.  Watari would forgive her if she was away for a bit longer, she supposed, and she doubted that Tsuzuki or Terazuma had returned in the short time it took her to circle the block.  And if they had, she would pick up lunch on her way back, and all would be forgiven.

She turned to the left rather than the right at the end of the street, walking across a street crossing and into a less urbanized area of the city.  Dozens of shrines lined the cobblestone streets.  It was a very peaceful atmosphere.  It almost made her miss the days she had been alive, just another ordinary girl growing up in Kyoto, going to school, worrying about boys . . . not like now.

She stopped, abruptly.  She had not noticed until now how empty the air was.  Not a sound was carried on it, not even the slightest hint that there was life around her.  Wakaba unconsciously took a step backward and looked around.  She was the only one on the street.  Other than the sound of her own breathing, and the tap of her shoes against the cobblestone, there was nothing.

Something . . . was very wrong, she thought.  This wasn't normal at all.

Suddenly, she wanted nothing more than to be back at the hotel with Watari, and Terazuma and Tsuzuki.

Wakaba turned to go, and that was when an arm wrapped around her from behind, pinning her arms to her side, and a soft, gentle voice said in her ear, "Don't struggle if you want to live."

She screamed.

Terazuma was walking back to the hotel, newspaper under one arm, a styrofoam cup of coffee held in the opposite hand, and a cigarette between his lips.  He had told Watari and Wakaba that he would not be gone for more than an hour, and inevitably, that hour had multiplied by three.  He simply had a lot on his mind, and the last place to have conductive thoughts, was trapped in a hotel room with Watari and Kannuki.

He took a sip of coffee.  Right now, he wanted nothing more than to get back to the hotel, and to take a nice, long nap.  He had been up practically the entire night, trying to find the missing piece to this case, but he had come up with nothing . . .

A scream tore through the air and reverberated in his ears, a less than enjoyable side-effect from having been conjoined with a shikigami.  

He paused, waited a beat, and it came again.  This time, he recognized who the voice belonged to.

"Kannuki."

He dropped the coffee and newspaper and took off running in the direction it had come from, shoving his way through people, and stopping traffic dead in place when he ran across the traffic-filled street.  The sound had come from the shrines, somewhere around there, somewhere around where he and Tsuzuki had found Kai, he thought blindly.  It brought back images of that dead woman to his mind.

If that happened to Kannuki . . .

He closed his eyes briefly, tightly, and forced himself to run faster.  He had to reach her.  There was no way, no way in hell, that he would let her die.

He slammed into someone coming from the opposite direction.  Cursing, he got to his feet, and was prepared to start running again, when two hands clapped down on his shoulders and stopped him.

"Terazuma?  What's the rush?"

He blinked.  "Sempai?"

Tsuzuki blinked right back at him, amethyst eyes wide with confusion.  He glanced at Hisoka, who could only offer a shrug in response.  Neither of them had ever seen Terazuma quite like this before.

Terazuma lifted his hands and clapped them down on either side of Tsuzuki's wrists.  The older shinigami still had his hands on his shoulders.

"Kannuki," he said.  "Did you hear that scream?  It was Kannuki."

"We didn't hear anything," Hisoka offered.

Terazuma looked at him, for a moment looking startled to see him there, and then shook his head.  "I heard it, she's--"

"We'll find her," Tsuzuki said.  "Which way?"

Terazuma dropped his hands from Tsuzuki's wrists, shoved a hand through his hair, and looked around blindly.  "How the hell should I know?  I was following the sound, and then I crashed into you, and now there's nothing to go by and goddammit--"

A scream silenced him.

The three shinigami ran.  Terazuma took the lead, following the sound, and Tsuzuki and Hisoka followed, barely managing to keep up with his long strides.  They ran for what seemed to Hisoka to be a hopeless amount of time, with no further indicators of which way they should have gone, but Terazuma kept going.  Hisoka and Tsuzuki followed, blindly trusting him to take them to Wakaba.

They came to a clearing and Terazuma stopped.

"Kannuki!"

Hisoka saw a flash of red, heard Terazuma shout something, Tsuzuki mutter something beneath his breath, and then there was chaos.

Terazuma had transformed and become Kagankokushungei, Tsuzuki had summoned forth Suzaku, and the two shikigami stood, staring down a inhumanly ferocious hydra.  Wakaba was prone on the ground, and Hisoka could barely make out a dark figure standing behind the hydra, but he had three guesses as to who it was.

"Hisoka!"  Tsuzuki, yelling above the roar of Kuro and the flames of Suzaku.  "Take care of Wakaba!"

Hisoka had to bite his tongue to keep from giving in to the urge to demand if Tsuzuki was absolutely insane, wanting him to go out there between three pissed off shikigami, but concern for Wakaba kept him from doing so.  Stepping beneath one of the extended wings of Suzaku and attempting to avoid her wings, he ran out between the shikigami, seized Wakaba, and gently pulled her from harm's way.

The shikigami advanced forward.  Kuro tore immediately into the hydra, fighting blindly, all teeth and claws and a blur of motion.  The hydra reared back, screamed, and tried in vain to retaliate.  Suzaku advanced forward upon Tsuzuki's command and attack from the side with her deadly flames.

Hisoka checked Wakaba over quickly.  He had thought, when he saw that flash of red, that it had been her blood.  He was relieved to see that she was unharmed, and what he had seen was the crimson material of her winter scarf.  She only had a few scratches and bruises, likely sustained when that person, the one controlling the hydra, had tossed her aside when Terazuma and Tsuzuki had appeared.

He shook her shoulders.  "Wakaba?  Are you okay?"

Her eyes slowly fluttered open.  "Hisoka-kun?"

"Yeah."  He nodded.  "You okay?"

She did not respond.  She did not have the chance to.  There was a shriek of pain from the hydra, followed by an identical one from Kuro.  The hydra vanished along with its master, and Kagankokushungei fell to the ground, its form fading and reverting to Terazuma when he struck.  Tsuzuki called away Suzaku and hurried to Terazuma.

"Hajime!"

Wakaba stood up, and before Hisoka could stop her, had rushed out and fallen to her knees beside Tsuzuki.  Hisoka slowly followed.

The hydra had cut a deep wound on Kuro, and being joined with his shikigami, it was felt the same by Terazuma.  He had a hand over his chest, flattened against the long gash that ran from shoulder to stomach.  His head was tilted back and his eyes were tightly shut.

"Hajime!" Wakaba said again, and she pressed her hands over the wound.  Her touch did not turn him to Kagankokushungei this time.

Terazuma cracked an eye open.  "What the hell?"  His voice was strained through the pain.  "Are you crying?"

She closed her eyes.

"Are you crying over /me/?"  Terazuma laughed, but it caused pain to rack through his body, and he stopped abruptly.  "'s okay," he said.  "Hurts, but I'll heal okay."

Wakaba looked at Tsuzuki.  He nodded, and forced a reassuring smile.

"We'll have Watari do what he can, but it should heal fine on its own," he said.

Wakaba nodded and smiled.

"See?  's fine."  Terazuma closed his eyes.  "So why didn't one of you idiots go after that guy?  He's our murderer."

Hisoka rolled his eyes.  "Concern for a friend.  You know, non-important stuff like that."

"Hah," Terazuma said.

Wakaba removed her hands from the wound, wiped them clean on the grass, then removed her jacket and put it over him.  Terazuma did not open his eyes until she took his hand in both of hers and held it tightly.

"You saved me," she said softly.

Terazuma blinked dumbfoundedly, then coughed and looked away.  "I didn't do anything.  And would stop with the mushy hand holding stuff?  Kagankokushungei's gonna come out, you know."

He wouldn't.  Terazuma had been able to control it for a long time now, but he was uncomfortable.  It was the best excuse he had.

Wakaba smiled, gave his hand a reassuring squeeze, and released him.

"Thank you, Hajime-chan."

He looked at her, saw the genuine gratitude in her eyes, and blushed.

". . . you're welcome."


	17. Chapter Seventeen

****

Notes: Boy-o, boy-o, where do I begin . . . My computer died. Went kersplat. Sang its final song. The sad part is that my old computer had Microsoft Office 2000, a program I was quite accustomed to using. This new computer that I got because the other one was just fried to hell is Windows XP and came with Microsoft Works. And Microsoft Works is a pain in the butt, to say the least.

Anyway . . . So I didn't really want to work on anything until I had Microsoft Office 2000, but there seems to be no way for me to get it as of yet. So I am braving my way through Microsoft Works.

Also, I finally figured out how this story is ending. And the next chapter will be the last. However, I hate to end stories on uneven numbers . . . It's one of my weird things. ^_^;; Thus I decided hey . . . I can just change the prologue to chapter one and this will end on eighteen even chapters! So I will be eventually changing all of the chapters to suit said needs . . . sorry, sorry. ^^

So yeah. Once I get this all figured out, the chapters will be changing. This one is actually seventeen. Also, I apologize for the format. Microsoft Works being a dork once again.

Lousy exposition rocks! 

****

Yami no Kenzoku

Chapter Sixteen

Despite his assurance that he would heal quickly, when Konoe and Tatsumi heard of Terazuma's wounds at the claws of the hydra, they summoned both he and Wakaba back to the headquarters. Tatsumi was sent to fill their void.

A week following the battle between shikigami and hydra, they had no clues as to where they were supposed to go, or what they were supposed to do. There was very little to go on. Logically, the best choice would have been to follow Muraki. He was the one person they knew to be able to control a hydra shikigami such as the one they had seen that day in the park. It was the same as the creature they had seen on the beach in Kamakura, and at the hotel in Osaka.

But Muraki was no where to be found. Tatsumi and Watari went again to speak to Oriya, but the man was even more vague with information than he had been before. He did not give them any indication of where they should begin to search for Muraki.

Kaiki spent his days bed-ridden. Whatever had happened to him, it seemed to have taken quite a bit of energy from him. Konoe and Tatsumi had wanted to send him back to JuOhCho, but he had refused to go. He said he wanted to be there when they found Muraki. When asked why, he would not divulge in any further information.

Nor could he tell them anything that had happened to him. He did not seem to remember. Try as they did to take him back to those days, he could not. He only said that whatever had happened, it was nothing he wanted to relive.

Thus, they were back at the beginning once again. Tsuzuki was ready to give up. They had succeeded in finding Kaiki -- wasn't that the point of all that they were doing? There had not been a murder since the last one, when they had found Kai. Muraki, were he the culprit behind them, which was of no doubt in Tsuzuki's mind, did not seem willing to make another move for the time being. Tsuzuki wondered why they stayed behind, driving themselves absolutely insane on the vain hope of finding Muraki.

Tatsumi did not agree with him. He claimed that though they had achieved their original purpose by finding Kaiki, they now had the responsibility of finding who was responsible for the premature deaths of so many people. Tsuzuki could not argue. Tatsumi always had the final say. He needed only to do his job without question.

As immersed and troubled by the events and circumstances surrounding them, Tsuzuki could not bring himself to even enjoy a slice of apple pie. While the others remained at the hotel, discussing their options and what they could possibly do about the dead end they were facing, he had gone out to a small restaurant not far away and indulged his sweet tooth. He had in fact already polished off a slice of pumpkin pie and a banana split sundae, but for some reason the apple pie was not nearly as appealing.

Poking at it with his fork, he pondered what little information they did have. They knew that the victims were female, and as had been done in Kyoto a year before, their hair was cut. That was seemingly for no reason other than to be a mockery of what had happened before.

They also knew that Kaiki had been close enough to Muraki to be able to track him down when the man attempted to kill yet another person. He had failed in saving that woman's life, and Terazuma had failed in being able to catch Muraki when the man escaped from the scene. They had taken Kai back to the hotel without a single clue to go on.

Finally, they knew that the murderer was able to control a hydra, which cemented it in their minds that it had been be Muraki. However... Oriya seemed to know more than he was willing to tell them, and from what little information he had given Tsuzuki and Hisoka the week before, it would seem that Muraki was /not/ the murderer.

Tsuzuki frowned down at his pie. When he thought about it, none of them had seen Muraki. Not even Wakaba, who was attacked by him (or someone else, apparently) in the park. What they had seen was the vague figure of someone at the feet of the hydra, but it had been impossible to make out who it was in the chaos around them.

"So," Tsuzuki said softly. "We're just at the same dead end as before."

He poked the slice of pie. It had gone cold, not surprisingly. With a sigh, Tsuzuki stood up, took out his wallet, and pulled out the sufficient funds to pay for his meal. He left it on the table and strolled outside into crisp night air, hands thrust into the pockets of his jacket.

He had not wanted to have any more bad memories of Kyoto. Not when he had been in the city a year before, but more importantly not now, after he had gone through one of the most difficult trials of his life here. Fate seemed to have other intentions for him. The bad memories of Kyoto would not leave him. It seemed he could not step foot in the city without bringing some kind of curse. People died when he was in Kyoto. People died /because/ of him. It was no different now than it had been before.

There was nothing he could do to stop it. It seemed that no matter where he went or what he did, a spiral of death followed him. He was terrified that soon, it was not going to be some stranger he saw die before his eyes. Soon, it would be someone he was close to, someone he cared about. And again, like that time before, he would be able to do nothing.

"Tsuzuki!"

Tsuzuki turned slightly, looking over his shoulder. Hisoka was approaching.

"It's late," the younger shinigami said between gasps for breath -- he had been running to catch up with Tsuzuki. "We thought you would've been back by now."

"Sorry, Hisoka," Tsuzuki said, smiling somewhat sheepishly. "Guess I lost track of time."

Hisoka straightened himself, inclining his head slightly as he regarded Tsuzuki curiously. He had something on his mind. Hisoka had always been able to tell when something was troubling Tsuzuki, not because of his empathy, but because his voice changed. It became less animated -- more quiet and serious than usual.

"Is something bothering you?"

The smile turned up more at the corners. "It's cute when you're concerned for me."

Hisoka turned a rather interesting shade of red. "Idiot... I worry about you."

Tsuzuki stared at him thoughtfully for a moment. Amusing to think how they had been at each other throats when they had first becomes partners, and even still could have the occasional spats. But now it was different. Both of them had matured. Hisoka was able to show more openly when he was concerned, and Tsuzuki was able to share what he was feeling.

Sometimes.

"Thanks, but I'm okay," he assured his younger partner. "Just thinking about the case. Anyway . . . let's go back now, na, Hisoka?"

Hisoka watched him a moment longer. He wanted to confront Tsuzuki, make him open up and tell what was bothering him. But he knew not to push Tsuzuki. The older shinigami never reacted well to being pushed -- it always made him pull further away.

"Aa..."

Hands in pockets, Tsuzuki began to stroll away. Hisoka followed.

Silence passed between them, the only sounds coming from their feet treading softly on the ground, and the distant sounds of Kyoto night life. Hisoka stole an occasional discreet glance at Tsuzuki, but the other shinigami never seemed to notice. Something more than their failing case was bothering him, Hisoka could sense. But unless he opened up, he doubted he would know what it was.

"You didn't bring a jacket."

Startled by the abrupt break of the silence, Hisoka turned to look at Tsuzuki. Tsuzuki smiled faintly at his bemused expression.

"You'll catch a cold," Tsuzuki said, doing his best to impersonate Tatsumi. Hisoka was reminded of when they had been investigating the Satsujinsha case, and he had gone to the park alone that night. Tsuzuki had found him and said the same thing in the same way, down even to the impersonation of Tatsumi.

"I'm all--"

But before he could finish, Tsuzuki had reached over and wrapped an arm around his shoulders. Tsuzuki pulled him against his side and closed Hisoka into the folds of his jacket. For a moment, Hisoka could do nothing but stare wide-eyed, startled by Tsuzuki's open affection. But at length, he relaxed, and settled comfortably into the curve of Tsuzuki's body. He closed his eyes briefly, allowing Tsuzuki to guide his movements.

Even for just a brief moment, he was happy to pretend that nothing was wrong. He was happy to believe, for a faint second, that he and Tsuzuki were just normal people. Not a shinigami, not involved in a hopeless investigation . . . just normal.

"I didn't want any more bad memories of this city."

Hisoka opened his eyes.

"Tatsumi and I came . . . a long time ago."

Tsuzuki had a distant look in his eyes. He was remembering something long since passed -- something he had never shared with Hisoka before. Hisoka was silent, waiting for him to say more.

"A little girl was supposed to die. She was supposed to have been hit by a car, but a man intervened and pushed her out of the way . . . but she was still listed in the Kiseki . . . so Tatsumi and I had to . . ."

He did not need to say anything more. Hisoka knew what had happened. It was why they were called shinigami -- gods of death. Sometimes, when someone did not die by their appointed time, it was necessary to intervene and do what fate could not. Hisoka had never had such an assignment before. He and Tsuzuki always managed to be able to avoid those.

"It was the first I had been given an assignment like that," Tsuzuki said slowly.

He was still in that time, reliving that moment. Hisoka could not do anything to reach him there. He could not begin to understand how to help him.

"The stairs..."

"What?" Hisoka asked.

Tsuzuki pointed with the hand that was not locked around Hisoka. Hisoka looked in the indicated direction.

Of course, his mind mocked, Tsuzuki would have meant those stairs.

Steep steps lined with decorational lanterns stood before them. Hisoka remembered standing on those steps, staring up at Muraki. They had been slick with blood that night -- he had nearly fallen. Muraki had laughed at him then, telling him that if he were to fall, he would receive bad luck for life.

That night, he had said for Tsuzuki on the steps. He had sat with Tsuzuki when the older shinigami returned. Tsuzuki had been upset that night. Muraki had told him that the deaths were his fault, that he was the one to blame.

"Tsuzuki . . ." Hisoka began softly. "Those deaths . . . now and a year ago, and when you and Tatsumi were here, they -- they weren't your fault."

Tsuzuki looked at him, startled, apparently not having expected Hisoka to see through his shields.

"Even so . . ."

"No, there isn't an 'even so,'" Hisoka interrupted. "You're not to blame. That's all."

Tsuzuki fell silent.

"Admirable of you, to say such things."

It was a voice that chilled both Tsuzuki and Hisoka. They did not need to turn to know its source -- the owner stood at the top of the stairs, silhouetted against the blood red moon.

"Muraki," Tsuzuki hissed.

The older man smiled down at him. He lifted a pale hand to brush away a troublesome lock of silver. It was then that Hisoka noticed a cut there, vertically angled beneath his false eye. It was at least a week old; the scab was beginning to fade.

"Good evening, Tsuzuki-san."

Cordial, as he always was. Hisoka felt Tsuzuki's arm tighten, on a protective instinct.

Muraki started down the steps, in painfully slow movements.

"This case has been giving you much trouble, has it not?" he inquired, in as casual of tones as one would use to discuss the most recent news.

Down another three steps. Tsuzuki unfolded Hisoka from the protection of his coat and moved the boy to stand behind him. The void that came from the lack of warmth and comfort left Hisoka feeling cold and alone. It was almost as though Tsuzuki was slipping through his fingers again, to a place that he could not follow him.

"Your friend was wounded by the hydra," Muraki said. "And the boy you call Shinori Kaiki is bed-ridden."

Down he came, until he was standing directly before Tsuzuki. Hisoka realized then that he was not a part of this. Tsuzuki and Muraki saw only each other. He may as well have been only a passing breath of wind.

"It must be very disheartening," Muraki said, but he sounded not at all sympathetic.

Tsuzuki said nothing, refusing to be baited. Hisoka could feel his hate for the man radiating through him. He had never realized it was so intense.

"I could offer you my assistance."

Tsuzuki snorted. "Your assistance? What has your assistance done for me in the past?"

He could hide the contempt in his voice no more than he could veil his emotions. Hisoka felt his anger and frustration and hate all coursing through him at the same time, and was over-powered by an overwhelming sense of nausea. His knees were beginning to feel weak beneath him.

"Tsuzuki . . ."

His pleading tone succeeded in breaking through to Tsuzuki. Tsuzuki turned to face him, and at once the overwhelming hate and anger was replaced with an almost suffocating amount of concern. The abrupt change nearly had Hisoka falling over backwards.

"Hisoka." Tsuzuki reached out a hand to touch him, but before Hisoka knew what he was doing, he had slapped the hand away. Tsuzuki drew back his hand, and Hisoka had to close his eyes to block out the wounded expression on his face.

"You should be more careful with that boy," Muraki suggested, but it was not of concern -- it was his usual mocking way. "You may well break someone as fragile as he is."

"Shut up," Tsuzuki growled.

"I'm okay," Hisoka insisted. Tsuzuki did not believe him.

Muraki, seemingly unconcerned with them, reached within the confines of his jacket and removed a pack of cigarettes. He put one to his lips and waited a moment, regarding them almost curiously, before he lit it up.

"What do you say, Tsuzuki-san?"

Tsuzuki was silent for several moments. Hisoka wanted to seize his arm, take him away from that place, but he could not move his arms. Even if he did, he was afraid of what the backlash might be. Though Tsuzuki was more consciously controlling his emotions now, he could still very well be hurt by the residue of his anger.

"I don't want Hisoka involved in this."

"Wha . . . Tsuzuki?"

Muraki smiled. "Agreed." He extended a hand. "Shall we?"

Thrusting his hands into the pockets of his jacket, Tsuzuki started forward. He did not even take two steps before a hand was reaching out and stopping him. Fingers gripped firmly in the material of the coat, Hisoka pulled Tsuzuki back. His forehead to rest against the older man's back.

"Hisoka--"

"I waited for you," Hisoka whispered. "That night, when you went with Muraki . . . I don't want to do it again."

Tsuzuki closed his eyes. "I didn't mean to make you wait for me."

He reached back and gently pried Hisoka's fingers from his jacket.

"Go back to the hotel. I'll be back soon. I promise."

Hisoka looked up at him. Tsuzuki softened into a smile. Lifting a hand, he dropped it down on top of Hisoka's head and gave his hair an affectionate tousling.

Helpless, Hisoka watched as Tsuzuki walked up the steps and joined Muraki. With a smile, the twisted man put a hand to the small of Tsuzuki's back and began to lead him away. Hisoka let out a shuddering breath.

He would kill Muraki with his own hands if he did anything to hurt Tsuzuki. They had all tried for so long to put the shattered pieces of him back together after what Muraki had done to him the last time -- he was not willing to repeat the experience.

". . . Tsuzuki . . . you idiot . . ."

With Tsuzuki and Hisoka still gone, even an after hour after Tatsumi had suggested that Hisoka go looking for him, and Terazuma at the infirmary at EnmaCho and Wakaba with him, the hotel had become eerily quiet. Watari consoled himself by keeping his laptop with him at all times, and occasionally pestering Tatsumi into doing something more than staring out the window and brooding. Tatsumi seemed to have an attraction to that sort of thing.

Kaiki was asleep in the next room. Even after a thorough examination, Watari could not tell what was wrong with him. From what it appeared, the boy was simply exhausted, but he had done nothing since Tsuzuki and Terazuma had found him. They had treated his wounds, and since then, he had remained in bed.

However, he had changed. Whatever had happened between he and Muraki had changed him. He had always been closed off and withdrawn, but then it had been because he was impossibly timid. It was more than that now. He almost seemed suspicious, as though he was waiting for someone to jump out and attack him at any given time. His sleep, though always long, was fitful and he often woke up and laid in bed for long periods of time staring at the ceiling. In those moments, Watari always found him doused in perspiration, and his breathing came labored.

But without him telling them what had happened, his physical and mental state was not enough to even begin to imagine what was affecting him so terribly.

"Hey, you." He poked 003 in the stomach. "I thought owls were supposed to be nocturnal."

The owl stared at him through half-lidded eyes, hooted half-heartedly, and nestled his head more deeply into his feathered chest to sleep. Watari sighed.

"Lazy bum."

He fisted a hand to his cheek. He was bored. And when he was bored, he came up with ideas for new inventions. Thus it was within a matter of seconds that he had pulled out a sheet of paper and was sketching out the design to something he was not quite sure the purpose of just yet, he just knew that it looked really cool and that was enough for him.

"Watari-san, what . . . are you doing?"

Watari snapped up from his drawing. He held it out proudly to Tatsumi. "I just came up with it."

"What does it do?" Tatsumi asked, looking bemused.

". . . that I'm not so sure about yet." Watari frowned and began to nibble on the end of his pencil.

Tatsumi raised an eyebrow. "I see."

"But I'll figure it out," Watari said determinedly.

"And I have the utmost faith in you," Tatsumi replied, but the blandness of his tone said otherwise.

Watari watched him pad over to the window to do his usual brooding, this time with a cup of coffee he had picked up from the hotel lobby for his company. He had never been able to understand Tatsumi and did not think he would begin to anytime soon. Tatsumi was a walking web of complexities, one he seemed unwilling to have anyone unravel.

"How long has Kurosaki-kun been gone?" he asked at length.

"Hm~m . . . an hour, something like that," Watari answered. "Don't worry about them. They probably just got side-tracked by the sights."

Tatsumi nodded, not seeming to hear him, and took a sip of his coffee.

"I'm gonna check on Kai," Watari announced.

Tatsumi said nothing in response, only continued to stare out the window. Something was bothering him. Watari imagined that it was Tsuzuki. The other shinigami had left in such a peculiarly dazed state that Tatsumi he immediately began to worry about him. Tsuzuki always had that affect on him.

Kai's room was adjacent to the room that Tatsumi and Watari were sharing. A door connected the two rooms. Watari slipped in and was engulfed by darkness. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust.

"Kai?"

He could make out a vague figure seated at the table beside the window. It turned slightly upon hearing his voice.

"What's wrong?" Watari asked, venturing a step closer.

Kai shook his head. "Nothing, I just . . . I woke up and wanted to look outside."

"In the dark?"

Kai laughed softly, but it was a broken, harsh sound from having not used his voice much recently. "I suppose it is kind of creepy . . . sitting alone in the dark."

"Nah, not real creepy."

Watari took a seat across from him. Despite how much sleep he had indulged in the past week, he had dark circles beneath his eyes, and a vacant look about him. Something more was wrong with him than what was within their capabilities to know, Watari was sure of that much. But he knew not to pressure Kaiki into telling them what it was.

"Watari, before I died, I was possessed by that demon . . . it was inside of me. But I was still alive inside of it. I knew what was happening, I just . . . wasn't controlling anything."

Watari did not say anything.

"Do . . . do you think people would forgive me, if it was something else making me do . . . making me not be myself?"

"What are you talking about?"

Kai shook his head. "No, never mind. It's not important."

Watari thought it was, but did not pressure him.

"I'm tired," Kai said quietly. "I'm going to get a bit more sleep . . ."

"All right." Watari reached over and messed up his hair. "Feel better, kiddo."

He pulled the door connecting the rooms to, so that he and Tatsumi would be able to hear him if he needed them for something. Tatsumi glanced up as he reentered the room.

"How is he?"

Watari scratched the back of his head, puzzled. "He said something . . . kind of funny. He wanted to know if he would be forgiven if for some reason, he wasn't being himself."

Tatsumi frowned.

"Could just be the ramblings of a sleep-starved, scared kid, though," Watari added.

"Maybe," Tatsumi agreed. "Well . . . I think I may go look for Tsuzuki-san and Kurosaki-kun."

Watari blinked at him. "You that worried?"

"Something . . . seems wrong."

Tatsumi shrugged helplessly. He did not know where to begin to explain. He simply had a feeling that was nagging at him, some kind of sixth sense, that told him to find Tsuzuki and Hisoka. It was not that he thought they were in danger or anything quite like that; but still, he was worried.

"All right then," Watari said. "Watch out for yourself."

"Aa. I'll be back shortly."

It was within Tatsumi's nature to worry more about Tsuzuki than he did anyone else. Past circumstances had made it somewhat of a second nature to him, to be concerned for his shallow fellow shinigami.

He had only partnered with Tsuzuki for three short months before it had become too unbearable for him. They had both been young and inexperienced shinigami at the time, not quite comprehending of what it was they were to do as gods of death. The reality of it struck Tsuzuki far worse than it had Tatsumi. It had broken Tsuzuki, shattered him far worse than he had been since he had first come to the Shokan Division. Tatsumi, unable to watch him spiral further and further down to a place of no return, called off their partnership.

Shortly after that, he had permanently resigned from field duty.

Yet still, though he had promised himself then that he would not be the one to pick up the pieces when Tsuzuki fell, he was even now that person. Even when he knew it better to not intervene, he did for Tsuzuki's sake. Kyoto the year before, when he had been willing to let Touda destroy Tsuzuki, had been the only time he had restrained and not stepped in. And the guilt he felt for it still remained with him.

Sometimes he wondered if perhaps, in the end, his decision to separate from Tsuzuki had been the wrong one. Instead of attempting to help him, he had given up on him without so much as a backwards glance. He still remembered how he had hurt Tsuzuki .

__

"I am not going with you on this case."

"Ah . . . okay. Well, it's an easy one anyway. Next time then--"

"Nor next time. Or after that . . ."

Not again.

__

"Ah . . . I see."

"I'm sorry, Tsuzuki-sa--"

"It's okay! I understand. I'm okay. I've gotten used to this sort of thing."

He had been trying to hide how it had hurt him with those words. Tatsumi had watched him walk away helplessly, wanting to apologize, to somehow make it work out better for the both of them, but he had been unable to do anything. He had simply let Tsuzuki walk away, and he had never tried to console or help him after that.

He had become harsh with him. Believing that the only way that Tsuzuki would adjust and accept his responsibility as a shinigami, he had treated him badly. He often blamed him for the debt troubles of the Shokan Division, or for the damage done to EnmaCho whenever Kagankokushungei and Tsuzuki's shikigami went on rampages. He had told Tsuzuki he would not amount to anything, with his carefree way of doing things.

It had not worked. It had only hurt him more to act such a way toward Tsuzuki.

"Ah . . . Kurosaki-kun?"

He had come to a dimly lit area, illuminated only by the decorational lanterns that lined the staircase before him. Hisoka was seated on one of the middle steps, his knees pulled up to his chin, and his arms wrapped around his legs. He glanced up upon hearing Tatsumi's voice.

"Tatsumi-san."

Tatsumi took a step forward. "What are you doing here?"

"Waiting for Tsuzuki," Hisoka answered. "We found Muraki. Tsuzuki went with him."

"Why?"

Hisoka removed his arms from his legs and stretched them about before him. "He said that he could help with the case. You know Tsuzuki . . ."

"He would not have thought twice about going with him," Tatsumi concluded. "That fool."

"He told me to go back to the hotel, but . . . I didn't want to leave in case he came back here." Hisoka turned his gaze skyward. "Muraki probably took him to the KoKakuRou."

"Then . . . we will follow."

Oriya was no less than pleased about Muraki bringing Tsuzuki to the KoKakuRou. He complained about what had happened the time before, how Muraki had managed to disturb all of his other guests that were in the private rooms surrounding that which Muraki and Tsuzuki had shared. Muraki had not seemed very apologetic about it, but was a convincing man. Oriya let them in, though it was grudgingly and on the pain of death for Muraki.

Muraki poured sake for the both of them, but Tsuzuki refused to touch his. He simply sat and waited, amethyst eyes gazing through the open screen door into the courtyard, where Oriya sat and indulged in his pipe. His naked sword sat across his knees, as though daring them to do anything. Tsuzuki stared at its glinting face in the moonlight and was reminded of watching Oriya and Hisoka exchanging blows. They had both been impressive, but Hisoka had been better.

"Your anger toward me is hardly misplaced, Tsuzuki-san," Muraki said lightly, "but your attitude is somewhat irritating. Please relax."

Tsuzuki glanced at him, but only briefly. "The last time we were alone together, you tried to kill my shikigami."

Muraki chuckled softly. "Still sore about that, are you?"

Tsuzuki did not respond. He had been more than sore; he had been infuriated. His shikigami were very important to him, and Muraki had nearly killed SohRyu. It was not an offense he could easily forgive, no more than he could forgive Muraki for what he had done to Hisoka, or to Kaiki, or to anyone else's life the man had ruined. All he felt toward the man, all the anger and frustration and misery, he felt was deserving in every possible way.

Muraki took a sip of his sake. "You still wear your watch on your right wrist."

Tsuzuki touched his left hand to the leather wrist band.

"You still believe you have something to hide."

"This is not what we came here for," Tsuzuki said softly.

Muraki smiled. "No. I suppose it is not."

But he was in no rush to get to the reason why they were. He finished what remained of sake and slowly poured himself another helping.

"Tsuzuki-san, have you considered that all of these cases you have had recently are somehow connected?"

"What . . . do you mean?"

Muraki sighed, in the exasperated way a parent did when their child was asking silly questions with quite obvious answers.

"They have been connected, all of them, in one way or another. I should know -- I was the manufacturer of quite a few of those connections."

Tsuzuki's fingers tightened unconsciously around his wrist. "How?"

"All through that boy -- your 'Shinori Kaiki.'"

"What does Kai have to do with this?"

"Everything, Tsuzuki-san," Muraki answered patiently. "The person you know to be Shinori Kaiki does not exist. He is no more than a false persona built upon an existing one."

Tsuzuki stared at him. What Muraki was saying made absolutely no sense. And even if it were true, and Kai was not the person they believed him to be . . . how would Muraki know who he really was?

"It began at the school, with the demon case. His death was no accident. It continued on to the hotel, where you met me, and even into Kamakura. And he is now the only cause for you to be in Kyoto at this moment."

"I don't understand . . ."

"Shinori Kaiki is Shindo Saki. Your Shinori Kaiki is my elder brother."

Tsuzuki stared at him wide-eyed, unbelieving. It was impossible. That person -- Muraki's brother, he had been killed a long time ago. His name even appeared in the Kiseki. If he were alive, his candle in the House of Candles would burn anew, and his name would disappear from the book of the dead.

It wasn't possible.

"That . . . can't be. You're wrong."

"Wrong?" Muraki repeated. "No, Tsuzuki-san, I assure you I am telling you the truth. You met Sakano in Tokyo. He was a colleague of mine. He had studied the same courses as Professor Satomi, whom you met a year ago right here in Kyoto. They had worked together on genetic research. He was a master of his field.

"He made what could have been the perfect body, from the bodies of others. It was Saki that we used to complete it. Unfortunately, it worked far well than we had anticipated.

"Saki was able to escape, but like an idiot, was unprepared for the outside world. He was in a small car accident -- it hit him full on. He was rushed to the hospital and awoke to no memory of who he was and where he had come from.

"That was when the persona of Shinori Kaiki was built. He was placed in a foster home service and eventually adopted -- I followed him and tried to bring him back. There was a struggle, and I killed the woman that had taken him in. His memory, from the accident, was prone to come and go. That was why he carved into his arm that I had killed his mother, but after a month, he did not even know what that meant.

"Pieces of Saki began to appear. At times, Saki would be in complete control. In others, it would be Kaiki. They were trading control of one body -- a body that cannot sustain the both of them.

"In his moments of consciousness, Saki knew that I was following him. He realized there was one place that he could go that I could not follow. Thus, he chose to become a shinigami. He was the one that led the demon to the school. He was the one that unleashed it on those people. And eventually, he let it take him, or rather, Shinori Kaiki . . . and he awoke a shinigami in the perfect body, one that could and would last.

"The Descartes Manor? Phillip Descartes was the man that funded Doctor Sakano and Professor Satomi's research. How you all managed to end up there I find odd luck. I happened to be there to discuss the matter of Saki and the lost body, which had been our only evidence of the research being a success. And what should happen, but for all of you to walk right into my hands.

"He had changed. I was not sure if it was him any longer. That was why I took him, to examine him. I was unable to do a thorough examination before I was interrupted, and so I only had assumptions to go on.

"Thus I amused myself with you and the boy for the time being, and then following, I learned that you were in Kamakura. Seeing an opportunity to see your Shinori Kaiki once again, I followed and asked that he be brought to me. The scar around his neck confirmed that it was Saki, but the persona of Kaiki had become much stronger. I saw no trace of Saki in him, and hoped to draw him out by what happened on the beach that night . . .

"I succeeded. Saki was able to take complete control of the body, and has been for quite some time now. He was the one that killed the women here. When you found him in that alleyway, he knew he would be found out. He panicked. He shot that woman, and then turned the knife on himself, to make you believe that I had been there and the one that wounded him.

"When you arrived, it was Kaiki that was in control once again. But Saki has been able to come out. The one you met a week ago, controlling the hydra, that wounded your friend? That was Saki. Had you kept an eye on him, you would have realized that he was gone from the hotel.

"Both are struggling for control. I do not think it will be long before Saki wins."

Tsuzuki said nothing. Silence fell over them. From outside, there came the distant sound of one of the golden fish in the looking pool flipping out of the water and splashing back in. Oriya took a deep drag from his pipe and let it out slowly, methodically.

"We have visitors," he announced, rising and padding quietly away. Muraki followed him with his eyes.

"Why should I believe you?" Tsuzuki whispered.

Muraki focused his silver eyes on him. "Because, Tsuzuki-san, I have nothing to gain from lying to you. My only goal is to kill Saki."

Oriya returned, leading Tatsumi and Hisoka with him.

"Tsuzuki-san, are you all right?" Tatsumi asked immediately.

Tsuzuki slowly turned to look at him. "Tatsumi . . . Hisoka."

A cell phone began to ring before anything more could be said. There was a puzzled moment in which the five men looked for the source. Tsuzuki realized it was his and numbly fumbled it from the confines of his jacket.

"Ah . . . this is Tsuzuki."

The others said nothing. Tsuzuki was silent for a moment, then nodded his head.

"I got it. We'll get on it right away."

He snapped the cell phone shut and looked up at Tatsumi and Hisoka.

"That was Watari. Kaiki . . . is gone."


	18. Chapter Eighteen

****

Notes: A review was left that said that Tatsumi is younger than Tsuzuki. In death years, that's true. But I always thought that Tatsumi died when he was older than Tsuzuki was when _he_ died. So I always say that Tsuzuki is younger in comparison to Tatsumi, because Tatsumi's physical body is older.

Whups, and it would appear that I had Saki's surname wrong. It's Shidou, not Shindo. Well, my mistake. I didn't research. Just asked some friends. ^_^ Also, the spell incantation I have Tsuzuki use . . . I wanted it to be the one from episode 2 of the TV series, but I don't quite recall it. So I used Seishirou's from episode 8 of X TV. ^^;;

The lyrics at the very end are from "When The Stars Go Blue" by the Corrs and Bono of U2.

On even MORE of a side note, I'll adjust the chapters listing WITHIN the chapters when I have the chance… heh.

So . . . this is really the end! Wow, I thought I'd never make it. 'twas a fun, wild ride. ^^ I hope it was as enjoyable for the readers as it was for me.

****

Yami no Kenzoku

Chapter Eighteen

It was a terrible thing to be forced to share a body.

Saki knew that pain all too well. Kazutaka seemed to think he should have been grateful for the body he had been given. He believed that he should be grateful for a body that could not even last for more than a few weeks at a time. That was why he had been forced to become a shinigami. To escape his deteriorating body, and to escape the brother that was attempted to track him down simply for the sake of killing him.

Grateful. For a body that he was forced to share with the persona of someone that did not even exist, someone that almost had constant control. It was /his/ body. He was the dominant personality. He controlled the memories; he was the one that it belonged to. The persona of Shinori Kaiki was nothing but a vague person that had been built upon an existing persona following that idiotic car accident.

He knew that the shinigami were coming for him. It was only a matter of time until they found him, and he welcomed the challenge. They had proved to be quite amusing in the past, and now that they knew the true identity of their friend, it would be far more interesting.

If he was fortunate, his dear younger brother would follow them. He would be able to kill him just as easily as those shinigami. Rather like icing on top of the cake, so to speak.

"Hurry up, Kazutaka," he murmured. "It's time to finish this."

The shinigami split into two groups to search for Kaiki. Tatsumi found Watari and searched with him, and Tsuzuki and Hisoka went together. They had left the KoKakuRou without a spare word to Muraki, but Tsuzuki had a feeling that Muraki would be following them. He wanted to find Kaiki just as much as they did, though for entirely different reasons. Tsuzuki did not care if Muraki did follow. His qualm with Saki was none of his concern. He was only a part of it if Muraki got in their way.

He and Hisoka walked together through the silent streets of Kyoto, both immersed in their own thoughts. Tsuzuki was completely focused on what was about to come. He did not know exactly what to expect, but he knew that there was bound to be a fight if what Muraki had told him about Kaiki was true, and he really was Saki. They would be up against that hydra he had gained, as well as anything else Saki was able to throw at them.

Tsuzuki did not know what he would do if it came down to a battle, which Tatsumi seemed to believe most assuredly it would. He did not know if he would be able to fight someone that was, somehow, deep inside, still Kaiki.

He did know that he would not watch anyone else die before him. He would not let anyone be hurt. Too many times had he seen someone die or be hurt because of him. He would not let it happen again, not even if he died trying to protect all of them . . .

Hisoka glanced at Tsuzuki. They had shared no words since Tsuzuki had explained to all of them what Muraki had told them about Kaiki. Tsuzuki had remained silent and withdrawn, absorbed within his own thoughts, looking forward to whatever it was coming their way now. Hisoka did not try to draw him out of that shell. He knew it was impossible.

But the look in Tsuzuki's eyes . . . that fiercely determined gleam had him worried. He could tell that Tsuzuki was willing to do whatever was necessary, without any regard for his own well-being. Tsuzuki never cared for his own well-being. No matter what the case, he would always prefer that he be the one to feel pain before anyone else. He went to any lengths to make sure he was the one that suffered the most.

Because he hated that much to see anyone else hurting.

"Tsuzuki?"

"Mm?"

"Do you believe what Muraki said?"

Hisoka had not known what to believe. Watari had accepted as ungracefully as he had. Both had been too shocked to say anything, but Tatsumi . . . Tatsumi had taken it in stride, as though he had been expecting something like it. He had simply gone straight to business, splitting them up, and giving orders to sweep across the city in search of Kaiki.

No. Saki.

"I don't know what to believe, Hisoka," Tsuzuki answered softly.

It could have been a lie. It could have been another twisted, fabricated lie Muraki had created to manipulate their minds. But Tsuzuki did not see what Muraki had to gain from lying to him. All other instances, there had been some gain for him. In this one, there was none. This time, they had a common enemy.

Hisoka did not pressure him to say anything else. Tsuzuki would not talk if he was forced to. He never would, and Hisoka quickly learned that it was a hopeless cause to try.

"Listen," Tsuzuki began at length, quietly. "Whatever happens just happens. You can't regret any of it. So . . . don't be sad if something bad happens."

What? Don't be sad? Tsuzuki was speaking as though he did not believe that he would get out of this, Hisoka realized. He did not think he would survive. He was willing to give up, if he could not.

It was the same way he had spoken when he had been willing for Touda to kill him.

He had been forced to listen to Tsuzuki speak that way once before. He did not know if he would be able to do it again, no more than he could wait on those steps for Tsuzuki, no more than he would watch him in pain without doing anything to help him.

"Don't . . . don't talk to me like that!"

Tsuzuki turned to him, startled by the abrupt outburst. "Hisoka--"

"I had to listen to talk like that once, I won't again!"

Hisoka had his head lowered and his fists clenched at his sides. His shoulders were shaking, with anger and fear, and tears that he refused to let fall. He did not want to cry in front of Tsuzuki. He hated to cry, especially over something so stupid . . . It was stupid to cry.

"You promised to stay with me," Hisoka whispered.

__

"Please. Please promise not to stay away anymore."

"I promise."

"And . . . promise to stay with me."

"Hisoka?"

"Don't die out there . . . . Because it is Muraki you're going against, and I can't be with you, so . . . I'll worry."

"I promise, Hisoka. I'll stay with you."

Tsuzuki tentatively reached out a hand to touch his palm to the side of Hisoka's face. Hisoka still did not look up at him, too ashamed to be seen with the tears in his eyes. He had cried in front of Tsuzuki before, but . . . he hated how weak and vulnerable it made him feel. He didn't want to feel that.

"I just don't want you to be hurt," Tsuzuki said softly.

Hisoka looked up at him. The tears still remained in his eyes, but his expression had become fierce.

"You're the only one that hurts me," he accused. "When you do this . . . you're the only one that hurts me."

Tsuzuki flinched. His hand fell away from Hisoka's cheek. Unable to look at him, he turned away.

"I don't mean to," he whispered. "I never mean to hurt anyone . . ."

Eyes closed, Hisoka encircled his arms around Tsuzuki from behind, and buried his face into the folds of his jacket. Startled by the touch, Tsuzuki stiffened slightly.

"Hisoka?"

"Don't you understand?" Hisoka asked quietly. "You idiot . . . you can't leave me. You made a promise."

Tsuzuki slowly closed his eyes. He brought up his own hands and closed them over Hisoka's wrapped around him.

". . . I won't leave you."

Oriya was seated outside in the garden of KoKakuRou when Muraki emerged. He was once again dressed in his usual pristine white clothing. Oriya lifted his gaze long enough to pass his eyes over him briefly, but apparently unconcerned, he turned his head away. There was something almost decidedly pouty about the way he was acting, as though Muraki had done something to insult or scorn him.

"Good luck," Oriya said.

It would have been quite like Muraki to shrug his shoulders and say that he needed no luck on his side, but even he was not arrogant enough to pretend that it would not be difficult. Becoming a shinigami had changed Saki. He had become much more powerful, powerful enough that he had been able to seize Muraki's chosen summon, the hydra, as his own. What he had intended to be a simple, menial task when he had first began his obsession with killing his older brother, had now become something much more difficult. He did not pretend to believe it would go well.

But it was a chance he was willing to take. He had waited long enough that he had to seize the opportunity, before those shinigami stopped him. Or perhaps worse -- found a way to suppress the persona of Saki so that it Kaiki would be the dominant force in control.

"Mm," was all he said, not sounding particularly concerned. He adjusted the lapels of his jacket and started to stroll away. Oriya's voice called him back.

"Is it really worth it?"

Muraki glanced back at him.

"To throw your life away, if you have to," Oriya said. "Like you were willing to do a year ago."

"I suppose I am."

"'ch." Oriya spit, as though there was a foul taste in his mouth. "I told you a year ago not to talk as though you're going to die. You always talk like that. But you never do. You always come back. Like that damn cat."

Muraki smiled, apparently amused to be linked to the cat that always came back in the child's song.

"Then I suppose I'll drink with you tonight, then."

"Damn straight." Oriya nodded, seemingly pleased that Muraki had come to his senses.

Muraki raised a hand in sign of a parting gesture. "Til then."

The only one that was ever concerned for him was Oriya. He rarely did anything to thank him, but . . . if all Oriya wanted was a promise that he would return, he could give him that. Even if it could be a lie someday, it was what Oriya wanted to hear . . . though he as aware as Muraki that it could have been no more than a lie meant to comfort. It just simply . . . made things much less bleak if Muraki did not talk as though he were about to die.

He did not know where Saki was, nor did he even have so much as a vague idea to begin looking. However, with two pairs of shinigami searching for him as well, if it came down to it, he would simply follow the sounds of destruction. It would certainly to prove to be quite a massacre if it came down to the hydra and Tsuzuki's shikigami.

KoKakuRou was not far from the ancient steps where he had met Tsuzuki that evening. He walked in that direction, hands thrust in his pockets, in all outward appearances unconcerned with anything that had happened or was about to happen. No sense worrying, really, over things he had no control over.

Saki stood at the bottom of the steps.

"'evening, Kazutaka," he greeted with a faint smile.

"Good evening," Muraki returned, as equally cordial as Saki.

Saki made a vague gesture with his hand. The hydra appeared behind him without so much as a warning. One moment it was gone, and the next it was there, lurking over Saki and awaiting his command. Its six yellow eyes fixated on Muraki, eager for a kill. The talons scratched into the ground impatiently; green flames leaked out from the open mouths.

Muraki lifted a hand and waved it through the air. A white dragon, not his chosen summon, but useful, appeared behind him, twisting through the air and shrieking a blood-curdling battle cry. The hydra's eyes flicked to it eagerly.

"Go," Saki commanded. Muraki snapped his fingers.

The dragon hydra met mid-air and everything became a flurry of teeth, claws, flames, and screams of pain and rage.

"I won't break my promise."

Tsuzuki gently unwound Hisoka's arms from his waist and turned to face him. Hisoka looked up at him. He had a small, hint of a smile lurking on his face. It was how he smiled to reassure that everything would turn out all right in the end. Hisoka felt embarrassed by it for some inexplicable reason and pulled away from the circle of Tsuzuki's arms. There was a slight blush across his cheeks.

"Idiot," he muttered, lifting a hand to rub away the few tears that had fallen. 

Tsuzuki just laughed and continued to smile.

"Come on," he said, tossing an arm around Hisoka's shoulders. "We still have to go find Kaiki and see if we can help him."

"H-hey, don't be all friendly!"

"Who's friendly? You latched onto me!"

"Sh . . . shut up!"

Tsuzuki would have continued to tease him, but their antics were cut short. The sound of a pain-filled shriek filled the air. Tsuzuki whirled around, turning in the direction of its source. It was coming from a few blocks away.

"Someone found him before we did," he murmured. "Come on, Hisoka!"

He started running. Hisoka, though slower by nature and with shorter strides than Tsuzuki, was able to keep right on his heels. Tsuzuki lead them, twisting and winding through buildings, and over anything that blocked their path. He had to stop a help Hisoka over a fence that stood directly in their path, but once they were both safely over, they started running once again without question. Tsuzuki knew where he was going.

"There!" he exclaimed.

They were at the steps. The hydra that they knew so well had pinned a white dragon to the ground. Hisoka remember it in a flash -- it was the white dragon that Muraki had unleashed in the storage building in Nagasaki, when he and Tsuzuki had first met and worked out their first case together. Tsuzuki had only summoned Suzaku and it had backed down. Hisoka knew then that it was no match for the hydra, if it had taken SohRyu, Suzaku, and Byakko to take it down at the Descartes Manor in Osaka.

"Tsuzuki, look."

Hisoka stretched out a hand, pointing to where Muraki, quite like the prone white dragon, was flat on the ground on his side. His normally pristine clothing was stained red. Tsuzuki did not know whether or not they should do anything to help him, considering . . . considering /everything/ . . . 

But his conscience got the better of him.

"Hisoka, make sure he's okay!"

Hisoka looked puzzled for a moment, but nodded and went to the fallen man's side.

Tsuzuki pressed his hands together in a incantation gesture. He murmured the same prayer he always did when asking for assistance from his shikigami, and called for Byakko. The white tiger appeared on the wind that had suddenly picked up around them, whipping all around them with a force strong enough to barrel them over. Byakko stood protectively over Tsuzuki, teeth bared and snarling at the hydra.

The hydra lifted its three heads from where it had been nosing about the white dragon curiously. Its eyes locked on Byakko and it hissed.

"It's useless," a voice, calm and rational, called over the hissing of the hydra and the snarling of Byakko. "Byakko could not defeat it before -- he can't now."

Tsuzuki's eyes narrowed. That voice . . .

"Kaiki?"

From behind the hydra, Saki emerged, smiling.

"No, you're wrong," he said quietly. "I'm Saki. It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Tsuzuki. Well . . . in a manner of speaking."

"Why are you doing this?" Tsuzuki demanded.

Tatsumi and Watari, having also heard the sounds of the hydra and the white dragon, appeared. Seeing Hisoka kneeled beside Muraki, Watari went immediately to his side. Tatsumi remained standing a small distance from Tsuzuki. Tsuzuki was certainly the better fighter -- he always had been and always would be -- but he could still support him.

"Not for the same reasons as my dear little brother," Saki answered, smiling still. "His reasons are deranged. His only goal is to kill me. Me . . . I've never really had a goal. I just enjoy killing people."

The wave of darkness hit Hisoka hard enough that he was forcefully knocked backward. Watari caught him around the shoulders.

"Bon!"  
  
There was nothing but darkness. It was the same that Muraki had felt to him, only . . . it was worse. Somehow, it was worse. There was no danger, no hate, no frustration. He could feel nothing of motive or reason. All that was there was a vague feeling of amusement and overwhelming darkness.

"Hisoka!"

Saki seized the opportunity of Tsuzuki being distracted by his young partner. He snapped his fingers, and understanding the unspoken command, the hydra lunged forward. The jaws of its right head burrowed deep into Byakko's neck. The tiger screamed out in pain and struggled to escape the death grip. He dug his claws into the sides of the hydra, but protected by its thick scales, he succeeded in doing nothing but minor scratches.

Tsuzuki knew that Byakko could not defeat the hydra alone. Pressing his hands together, he once again murmured the same incantation as before, and called upon SohRyu. The sea serpent appeared and immediately went to the aid of Byakko. The hydra whipped around another of its heads and focused on deflecting SohRyu. There was a brief struggle; SohRyu attempted to free the grip from around Byakko, but it was in vain. The hydra took the opportunity of his close distance and buried its fangs into the soft under part of SohRyu's belly.

Tsuzuki drew an ofuda from the confines of his jacket.

"Tsuzuki-san!" Tatsumi exclaimed. "You can't battle that on your own, you'll--!"

He paid the warning no heed. Flinging out the ofuda, Tsuzuki pressed his hands together and formed the gestures as he spoke the spell incantation.

"_Rin. Byo. Tou. Shya!_"

Swarms of energy appeared in Tsuzuki's hands. He drew back his arms and threw them forward. The hydra shrieked with pain as the streams of light burrowed into its hard flesh, penetrating through what Tsuzuki's shikigami could not. It released its hold on both Byakko and SohRyu, and silently understanding that their master did not want them in the way, they drew back. Tsuzuki closed his eyes and focused his all on forcing the energy through the hydra. It was the only thing he could do.

"Tsuzuki-san!" 

Tatsumi was calling his name. He could not hold it for much longer. The hydra seemed to realize it as well. Rearing back on its hind legs, it let out a terrifying shriek. Green flames appeared in the mouth of the center head, slowly but surely gathering more and more energy as the other two screamed battle cries.

It unleashed the ball of flame. It struck Tsuzuki full in the chest. He was flung backwards. His back connected with a brick wall; the brick cracked beneath the force of his impact. Enraged, Byakko and SohRyu lunged upon the hydra.

"Tsu . . . Tsuzuki!" Hisoka screamed.

"Bon!"

Watari tried to hold him back, not wanting him to endanger himself any further after the rush of feeling he had received from unwilling delving into Saki's mind, but Hisoka tore free of his grip. He ran, unconcerned for his own well being, to where Tsuzuki was slumped over, unmoving.

"Tsuzuki!" He dropped down to his knees before the Tsuzuki.

His chest was split open. Hisoka could see nothing but blood. He could see only the blood and only the smell of burned, seared flesh. His hand was shaking as he slowly reached out to touch Tsuzuki's face. He tilted it up and looked at him. His mouth was slightly open, a stream of blood streaked down either side of his lips. Blood flecked his closed eyelashes.

"Tsuzuki," Hisoka whispered.

"Kurosaki-kun . . ."

Hisoka did not hear Tatsumi's voice. Desperately, he pressed his fingers to the side of Tsuzuki's neck.

No pulse.

"No . . ." Hisoka gripped Tsuzuki firmly by the lapels of his jacket -- what little remained. "You said you weren't going to leave, dammit! Open your eyes, Tsuzuki! Tsuzuki!"

Tsuzuki did not move.

Tatsumi stood, helplessly watching as Hisoka continued to shake Tsuzuki, begging him to wake up. He turned away when Hisoka encircled his arms around Tsuzuki's neck and burrowed his face into the curve of his neck. Hisoka gripped Tsuzuki tightly. It was impossible. Tsuzuki would never die that easily.

__

Tsuzuki . . .

He tried to call out for him in his mind. There was no response.

__

Tsuzuki, hear me.

My body for yours. Take mine. It's yours.

Just please . . . please open your eyes!

Tatsumi slowly turned to face Tsuzuki and Hisoka. He immediately drew in a sharp breath of disbelief and surprise.

Hisoka had gone limp against Tsuzuki. And Tsuzuki . . . was moving.

"What the hell?" Saki hissed.

An aura of violet light appeared around Tsuzuki and Hisoka. Tsuzuki stood up. Hisoka slumped to the ground. His wounds were beginning to close, at an alarming rate. It was natural to regenerate quickly as a shinigami, but as Tatsumi watched, the wounds closed, and all traces of blood disappeared from Tsuzuki.

Tsuzuki, possessed by some unseen force, stepped forward. Slowly, Hisoka drew himself up. The wounds that had been inflicted upon Tsuzuki had appeared on him. His chest was split upon, as Tsuzuki's had been. Blood streamed from the wound and pooled around he and Tsuzuki.

Tsuzuki lifted a hand. Crackling energy, like electricity, was circulating around his hand. Hisoka lifted his own hand and closed it over Tsuzuki's.

"My body for yours," Tsuzuki whispered.

He stretched out his hand in unison with Hisoka. The energy crackling along his arm shot to his fingertips and into the hydra. The twisted bands of energy surrounded the creature, engulfing it, wrapping around its neck, its legs, cutting off its circulation and breathing. It swarmed into the hydra and burned its intestines. It screamed, a horrible, terrible scream of pain that was heard throughout all of Kyoto.

Tsuzuki lowered his hand. The hydra crumbled to the ground. Thick, black blood leaked out from its open mouths.

"You . . ." Saki tightened his hands into fists. "Don't think this is over, Tsuzuki!"

Saki vanished, as did the body of the hydra. The aura surrounding Tsuzuki and Hisoka faded.

Both sank lifeless to the ground.

Tatsumi stood outside the chambers of EnmaDaioh, awaiting Konoe to return from his meeting with the master of JuOhCho. Konoe returned after a brief discussion with the lord, and together, he and Tatsumi started the trek down the hall to return to the Shokan Division.

"What did EnmaDaioh have to say about the recent events?" Tatsumi asked.

"He believes that there is no trace of Shinori Kaiki any longer alive, and considers Shindo Saki a rogue shinigami," Konoe answered. "He will be properly dealt with when the time comes."

Tatsumi nodded. "I see . . ."

They parted ways upon reaching Tatsumi's office. He looked in, saw the mounds of paperwork that had piled up, and sighed. He was always told that he was the workaholic of EnmaCho, but it was not because he enjoyed it, that was for certain. Rather than immerse himself in the work that needed to be done, he walked out of the office and down another hallway. He had more important matters he could attend to.

It had been two weeks since they had returned from Kyoto. Things had been very quiet around EnmaCho . . . he had not realized how quiet things really were without Tsuzuki and Hisoka.

He glanced into the open offices were most of the shinigami worked and frowned slightly. Then again, things could have been quiet because it appeared that no one was at their work stations . . . 

Continuing down the hall, as he drew closer to the last few rooms, the voices coming from them grew louder as he approached.

"Here you go! Ice cream will make you feel better."

"Ugh. Please, no more . . ."

"More for me, more for me!"

"Sheesh . . . what an idiot."  
  
"What was that?!"

"Behave!"

Tatsumi poked his head into the infirmary room and smiled. "I see you both are feeling better, Tsuzuki-san, Kurosaki-kun."

Tsuzuki had Terazuma by the neck and was attempting to strangle him. Wakaba had her hands over Tsuzuki's and was trying to stop him, and Terazuma looked rather comical, gagging and trying to escape the death grip. Hisoka, in the bed opposite of Tsuzuki, was looking rather sick to his stomach. Watari bouncing the bed did not seem to make it any better. The Gushoshin were fluttering around rather like chickens with their heads cut off -- appropriately -- and cleaning up the enormous mess that had been made when Wakaba had decided to shower Tsuzuki and Hisoka with get well soon presents.

"Hiya, Tatsumi!" Tsuzuki said cheerfully. He released Terazuma, and unprepared to be let go quite so abruptly, Terazuma crashed down to the ground. Wakaba looked at him sympathetically.

"Hello," Tatsumi returned. He glanced around at the various people filling the room. "I suppose it would be too much to ask for a moment alone with Tsuzuki-san and Kurosaki-kun."

"Nah, not at all, Tatsumi-san!" Wakaba said cheerfully.

"No problem," Watari said, echoing her sentiments. He dragged Terazuma up to his feet and helped Wakaba pull him from the room before Terazuma could get in another cheap shot at Tsuzuki. The Gushoshin sighed dramatically, looked around at the mess that had been formed, and shook their heads. Not wanting anything to do with that, they fluttered out of the room as well.

Tatsumi pulled over a chair between the two beds. "How are you both feeling?" he asked. "You gave us quite a scare."

Tsuzuki laughed a little sheepishly. "Sorry. And me, well, I'm feeling lots better."

"What about you, Kurosaki-kun?" Tatsumi turned to Hisoka. It was the younger shinigami that had taken most of the pain. Though Tsuzuki had been that was wounded, it was Hisoka that had taken all of the pain for him in the end.

"I'll be all right in a couple of days," Hisoka answered.

Tatsumi nodded. "That's good to hear."

He paused, wondering how to word his next question. Tsuzuki noticed him puzzling over it and smiled.

"You want to know what happened," he said.

" . . . well, yes, I would."

Tsuzuki glanced at Hisoka, but the boy only shrugged his shoulders. He did not seem to care if Tsuzuki explained it with out without him.

"When Hisoka and I first became partners, we had to synch together to be able to defeat Muraki," Tsuzuki said. "I was wounded and couldn't do it on my own."

"You synched together again?" Tatsumi asked.

A puzzled look overcame Tsuzuki. "Well . . . something like that."

"I remembered that Tsuzuki had been able to communicate with me through my mind the first time it happened," Hisoka interjected. "I was desperate, so I called out to him, and offered him my body. It was . . . the same as synching together, but different in a way . . . because somehow Tsuzuki's wounds were transferred to me."

"I don't know why that happened," Tsuzuki admitted.

Tatsumi nodded. Nor did he. He knew that it was possible for shinigami to link their power together, to synchronize with one another, so to speak, but he had never seen it happen quite like it had for Tsuzuki and Hisoka. Theirs was a much stronger bond than any other he had seen, was all that he could tell.

It made him somewhat sad to admit that, but somehow . . . he was also relieved. He felt that he could worry less about Tsuzuki. He and Hisoka would always be able to take care of each other.

"What happened to Muraki?" Tsuzuki asked.

"We took him to KoKakuRou," Tatsumi answered, "and Oriya-san took care of his wounds."

"And . . . Kai?" Hisoka asked.

Tatsumi closed his eyes. EnmaDaioh had labeled him a renegade shinigami and decreed that there was no trace of Shinori Kaiki within him any longer. In the end, it was Saki that won the battle for control of a single shared body.

"He no longer exists," Tatsumi said quietly.

"No longer exists?" Tsuzuki repeated.

Tatsumi shook his head. "And Shindo Saki has been labeled a renegade shinigami. Soon someone will be sent to track him down and deliver him to JuOhCho for judgment."

Tsuzuki closed his eyes. In the end, no matter how had wished it would not happen, someone really had 'died' . . . and there had been nothing he could do to change that. Kai was gone.

"Do not feel bad, Tsuzuki-san," Tatsumi murmured. "They were matters out of our control . . ."

Tatsumi stood up and quietly filed from the room. A moment of silence passed between Tsuzuki and Hisoka.

Hisoka did not know what to think. It was all too bizarre to form into true thoughts. Kai had been no more than a persona built upon an existing one, no more than just another personality in a body. The body had belonged to Saki. It was rightfully his, and . . . the persona had just been built. It wasn't real. Kai had never been . . . real. He had always been Saki.

"We'll see Saki again," Tsuzuki murmured.

Hisoka glanced at him. "Yeah."

"And maybe . . . somehow we can bring back Kaiki if we do."

". . . yeah."

Night fell upon Meifu. Hisoka awoke in the infirmary room late into the evening. He did not know what had woken him. It was not a nightmare, or any outside force that caused him to open his eyes. He had simply sat up and opened his eyes for no apparent reason at all.

He glanced around the room. A curtain separated his bed from Tsuzuki. He pulled it away to see Tsuzuki, and he drew a breath as it revealed only an unmade bed. He worried for a split moment before looking up. Tsuzuki was seated by the window, arms folded across the sill, his chin resting on his arms.

"Tsuzuki?"

Tsuzuki turned to him. "Sorry. I didn't wake you, did I?"

Hisoka shook his head. "No."

Carefully, he threw the thin blankets from his body, and in painfully slow movements, slid out of the bed. The abrupt shock of cold on his bare feet had a shiver running up his spine.

"Don't push yourself," Tsuzuki said quietly.

"I'm okay," Hisoka said. It still hurt somewhat to move too much, but he did not believe that lying around in bed all of the time was doing him much help. He needed to move around before his muscles turned to absolute nothing.

He padded over to stand beside Tsuzuki.

"What are you looking at?"

"The stars," Tsuzuki answered. He shrugged. "Couldn't sleep."

Hisoka looked up at the sky. In Meifu, all of the stars were much brighter than they had ever been on Chijou. There was no pollution in Meifu to block out their light, no city lights to dim them in the sky. Rarely were their ever gray night clouds to block them from view.

Tsuzuki reached out with one arm, encircling it around Hisoka's waist. He gently tugged the younger shinigami over to share the chair with him. Hisoka would have been startled by the open show of affection, but Tsuzuki had become steadily more willing to show and share it in the past few months. It had started at the manor, when he had been willing to let Hisoka sleep in his bed, and carried on to Kamakura, where Tsuzuki had often held him in his arms to comfort him. In Kyoto, there had always been something more behind those embraces.

But Hisoka would not question it. He was afraid that if he did, Tsuzuki would no longer share that affection with him.

Tsuzuki began to murmur softly below his breath, and it took a moment for Hisoka to realize that he was not murmuring nonsensical words. He was singing quietly.

"Where do you go when you're lonely," he sang softly, barely above a whisper. "Where do you go when you're blue . . . Where do you go when you're lonely . . . I'll follow you . . . When the stars go blue."

"Tsuzuki . . ."

Tsuzuki smiled. "It came to mind."

Hisoka did not say anything. He did not know the words to say to express what he was feeling.

Tsuzuki said it for him.

"I'll always follow you, Hisoka," he whispered. "I'll always follow, and I'll never leave you. I promise you."

Hisoka closed his eyes.

". . . and I promise you."


End file.
